


The Garrison Reserve

by chapstickaddict, readwing



Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Aramis has a wanderer's soul, Athos needs a break, F/M, M/M, Multi, New Orleans restaurant AU, OT3+1+1, canon typical mentions of alcholism, cooking au, gratuitous descriptions of food, lots of talk of food, no one's good enough for Porthos
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-28
Updated: 2016-11-10
Packaged: 2018-07-10 20:00:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 64,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7004380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chapstickaddict/pseuds/chapstickaddict, https://archiveofourown.org/users/readwing/pseuds/readwing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chef Athos has an up-and-coming restaurant, a new relationship with two guys who used to run a food truck, and an overworked floor manager who smuggled her ex-boyfriend onto his staff to play waiter. To say nothing of the quickly rising tide of peers and critics circling and waiting for him to implode. Again. </p><p>With crowds stretching down the street, they barely made it through the holidays with their sanity; worse, Mardi Gras is right around the corner. As much as Athos is dragging his feet on getting his life in order, they need another set of hands in the kitchen, and soon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“I know you lived in New York, you should be able to do this on your own,” Porthos muttered, catching Aramis by the strap of his messenger bag when he nearly walked headlong into a group of city workers gathered around a man hole. Aramis didn’t acknowledge his grumbling, too busy cooing over a new strawberry balsamic vinegar he had found earlier that morning in the market.

“I could mix it with some dark mushrooms and onions, maybe convince Athos to branch out into more vegetarian dishes,” Aramis mused. “Or serve it with a cheese tasting course. It’s good on it’s own, but oh, maybe a reduction."

Porthos dodged the large group of tourists working their way down the sidewalk and humming loudly in reply to be heard over their conversation. Aramis trailed after him without complaint. If left to his own devices, the other man would walk headlong into traffic and never notice.

“Or perhaps a marinade for a good steak, and pair it with a summer strawberry and sunflower seed salad.”

“You know you’re at your most adorable when you think Athos is gonna let you mess with his menu.”

Aramis scoffed, and Porthos pulled him up against a pair of shop windows as a box-laden delivery man flew by them. Once clear, Porthos shoved Aramis in front of him, ignoring the squeak it earned him for ripping him away from admiring the building across the street.

“Like a damn magpie, you are,” he growled. Aramis smiled at him, full-force and sunny enough to stop Porthos’ heart.

“You love me anyway,” he replied. He snagged Porthos’ hand, pulled him back, and pressed in close. Headless of the bustling chaos of New Orleans around them, Aramis dropped a kiss onto his nose. When he pulled back, he looked at Porthos like he hung the moon.

“Has anyone ever told you that you have a really nice face?” Aramis asked. Porthos burst out laughing.

“Actually, this shaggy lumberjack did just the other day,” he replied. “But yours ain’t so bad either.” Aramis’ sunny, cheerful expression retreated inwards, into something more intimate, and Porthos stopped resisting. He leaned in to press a firm, insistent kiss to that charming smile.

“Come on, now,” he said, pulling away before his heart could run away with his senses. “Athos is waiting for us.” They had missed the family meal with their last minute shopping excursion, but if they missed prep he was pretty sure Athos would fillet them both.

Aramis twisted their hands together, following along as Porthos led them through the crowds.

The Garrison was situated deep on the cross streets of the 10th Ward. Its clean, unassuming building was close enough to catch the eye from the tourist traps few blocks away, but offset enough that locals wouldn't avoid them for fear of running into said tourists. If he looked into the faded brick and mortar of the entrance, Porthos imagined he could see pieces of Athos’ soul speckled in with blood, sweat, and tears.

Letting themselves in through the back, they found Athos already had the lights on and the ovens warming. Their head chef stood at the high counter up front, leaning over to write up the day’s specials with notations on the side for Constance and the wait staff. This morning he had his beard trimmed down to stubble and his shaggy hair somewhat tamed and pushed back away from his face. He no longer resembled the scary mountain man Porthos remembered being unnerved by. Porthos attributed the newfound lack of intimidation to the fact that if he reached out to push Athos’ bangs aside, the man's intense blue eyes would flare to life. For all that Athos couldn’t speak his emotions, his face couldn't hide. Porthos was convinced that was why he tried to covered it up in hair.

Porthos greeted him with a gentle kiss, carefully containing his exuberance to a somewhat tamer version while they were in the restaurant—more for Athos' comfort than his own. He was still adjusting to Porthos’ and Aramis’ easy affection, and sometimes had trouble returning their gestures outside the walls of the apartment.

Not like that stopped Aramis from stealing his own (much more involved) kiss as he headed for his station.

A rundown radio/CD player, which Aramis had jacked out of that damn evil food truck they both worked in once upon a time, was jammed into an upper corner shelf. The old Carlos Santana CD inside it played at a soft thrum, filling the silence while Athos scanned over the morning checklists. Porthos leaned up to pop the CD tray open and traded out lilting Spanish guitars for smooth B.B. King.

He turned up the volume. A little traditionalism would catch some curious customers as the music drifted out the back door, down the alley, and onto the main road. Between following the music and catching a whiff of the food, they'd get hooked into walking in the door. Once Constance had them in her grasp, they wouldn't walk out without full stomachs and their wallets lighter.

“Good morning!” Aramis hollered towards the front room, grinning at the chorus of greetings from the wait staff, who were cleaning up the left overs from the family meal and getting the dining room set for service. Constance poked her head in, her copper curls pinned back and her clothes pristine.

“Heads up,” she greeted them with a strained smile. “Adele called in sick again. Also, we already have a line of customers outside.”

“We don’t open for another couple of hours,” Porthos startled. This was their prep time; the simple soups, fish fillets, and southern staples that they handled during lunch hours didn’t take long, but dinner was another matter. Aramis and Athos needed time to work on the technical aspects for their more high-end dinner menu. Porthos hadn’t even started on the baking for his desserts.

“I told them that. They said they heard the wait was worth it.” Her face was patient, but her fingers worried as she picked at her nails.

“Well, hell,” Aramis muttered, looking a little blown away. “I guess holiday word-of-mouth really did work out.”

A little too well, in Porthos’ opinion. And this was the third time that month Adele called in. Add to that the forming line outside, and it sounded like another nonstop day brewing up for them. They managed to push through being short-staffed in the kitchen, but when the front of the house had to scramble too, The Garrison fell into chaos.

Update delivered, Constance disappeared quickly, concerned with making sure the wait staff was prepared for the rush.

“Any progress on finding a new chef?” Aramis asked while rummaging through fridge. Porthos staying quiet while picking up a bandana from his stockpile in a drawer near his station. He tied his curls back and watched as Athos pinned the specials up on the wait staff board. He didn't acknowledge Aramis directly, instead making a distracted, humming noise while he straightened his notes.

“Not yet,” he finally replied. “We’re short on salmon today. Constance is telling the wait staff to talk up the amberjack ceviche and the jambalaya, so we can use the rest of the prepped food.”

“The interviews yesterday didn’t pan out?” Aramis persisted as he pulled out that morning's fish delivery for tonight's menu.

“Patience is a virtue,” Athos glanced up from his notes to glare. Porthos said nothing; this was fast becoming an old fight. As much as Athos dragged his feet, they needed another set of hands in the kitchen, and soon. They had barely made it through the holidays with their sanity, and Mardi Gras lurked around the corner. Busy wouldn’t describe the flood waiting for them two months down the road.

“So is time off,” Aramis shot back with a grin. “And, you know, relaxation. I guess we'll just be grateful you don't hire people just to fire them after one service anymore.”

“I only did that once, as a favor to you two.”

“Yes, you did hire Labarge to help us out during the holiday rush. Then you stood behind him all service and made disparaging comments about his skills and presentation. I’m surprised he only gave you a shiner at the end of the night.”

Porthos tuned out their bickering while he worked.

The Garrison’s menu specialized in French Creole seafood, which played up both Athos’ classical training and Aramis' eclectic mix of home cooking and experience working in every city from Montreal to Panama City. Porthos' own knowledge of cooking may have paled in comparison, but he knew neither of them could turn out a good popover if their lives depended on it. While he handled the bulk of their simple lunch menu and desserts in the evenings, Athos and Aramis had plenty of time to argue cuts of fish and the temperature of scallops.

He lost himself in his work. Blackberry and lemon tart filling he set aside until the brown sugar crust finished baking. During the lunch break, he would combine them and leave it to chill and set in the fridge until dinner. Egg yolks and sugar combined separately with lemon and orange, whipped and worked through a strainer for mousse, along with the vanilla whipped cream that would give it a traditional, fluffy texture. The softened apricots, cored pears, and peeled oranges were boiled down and puréed, to be combined with fried bread for the brioche perdu and paired with the lavender honey ice cream he had already chilling.

Dessert prep finished for now, Porthos started in on the lunch menu. The fried oyster and catfish po'boys he could handle in his sleep, the most challenging part was prying the oysters open (which he could do faster than Aramis and Athos, both of whom fussed at trying to keep their fingers intact). Next, he combined the cornmeal, paprika, ground pepper, garlic, onion powder, and an assortment of herbs, chili powder, cumin, and cayenne into the drudge. He kickstarted their temperamental fryer, which took a dog's day to heat up and splattered like a wet pup to boot.

Last night he had started their soup stock, and now he pulled it out to heat in a large stock pot on the stove, adding in a herbs and heavy cream, and a cup of grated Gruyere cheese to combine into their French Norman onion soup. The jambalaya base was similarly prepped, only needing a healthy dose of morning-fresh crawfish and quick, sautéed andouille sausage. The fresh shrimp was deveined and set aside in the fridge. Collards greens with onions and red peppers were set to steam while he started the hushpuppy batter, thrown together with more cornmeal and herbs.

By the time Porthos resurfaced, Aramis had broken down all their fish for the evening: catfish, bluefish, the day's amberjack special, a spotted trout, and striped bass. He was focused on mixing the cajun crab cakes appetizer, and Porthos could smell the enticing heat of the spices and lemon juice from his own prep station.

Athos' own attention was split between a lentil and bleu cheese salad and a thick cream base for the mahimahi and scallop à la nage. The fresh vegetables for the pouched trout were already lined up at his station.

Porthos took a second to breathe and mentally ran through his checklist again.

When they had started, they preferred to make their own bread. The past few months had rushed over them, blowing that plan away. Now, they sourced it out of Alice’s bakery down the street. Porthos’ mouth watered as he inspected the baguettes Athos had set to warm; what they had on hand should get them through the evening.

Constance rang the starting bell by the host station at the front of the house, signaling to everyone that the front doors were open for lunch. The first flood of tickets came in minutes later.

“Two soup, one catfish,” Athos called, sticking the first ticket on the taper. He would stay near that taper all afternoon and evening, monitoring the flow of orders, keeping Porthos and Aramis on track, and quality checking the food being sent out.

While handling his side of the cooking as well.

“Two soup, one catfish,” Porthos answered, yanking the appropriate plates from the stack in the corner.

The rest of the day was a blur. Porthos thought he remembered feeling Aramis press a kiss to his mouth between entrées, or Athos’ confident hands brushing against his shoulder as he flew by, but he couldn’t swear to it. He didn’t register the time until the last order for lemon mousse left the kitchen, and suddenly there were no more tickets in front of him. He blinked, pulling himself back to the surface of reality and realizing he was bone-tired. He leaned back against the wall and scrubbed his face with his hands. His arms stretched against his chef coat as he tried to loosen the tension from his shoulders. Athos ran a hand down his forearm and gave Porthos' wrist a reassuring squeeze before he headed toward the front of the house to check in with Constance.

“You good?” Porthos asked Aramis, who was leaning against his stove top, weariness in every line of his shoulders. Now that the dinner service was done, they would need to scrub down the kitchen. The workspaces wouldn't clean themselves.

Aramis gave him a grim smile, tired and not bothering to hide it. “We need more help.”

*

Porthos grew up in the 5th Ward. More accurately, he grew up on the 5th Ward, spending more nights than he cared to remember falling asleep against walls in back alleys. His only saving grace had been the bouncing job he scored at a local watering hole when he was sixteen, already towering over most of his peers. From there, he was able to get work behind the bar, and started earning real money. Part of that, he knew, was thanks to Charon, but Porthos didn't like to dwell on him much these days.

He hadn't been foolish enough to believe he could go to culinary school, not on his budget, and he was too reluctant to sink himself into loans without a backup plan. He spent years hoarding his tips under his mattress until it was enough to attend a few community college classes targeted towards food prep and basic culinary techniques.

He applied online to a job opening on a food truck, the same night a bar patron reached across the bar and grabbed his evening tips, running out the back before Porthos could clear the bar. Within a few hours, he got a call from Bonnaire, the truck’s owner.

It took him about two minutes to label Bonnaire a slimy worm. Capricious and talkative, he questioned Porthos minimally about his cooking experience—interrupting Porthos more than once to ask if he followed Bonnaire's 'food empire' on social media—before reassuring Porthos that he had the job so long as he could handle a cash register. He had a real chef on the truck anyways.

Porthos accepted.

He was thankful to find out that Bonnaire left all the day-to-day runnings of his food truck to his other employee, Aramis. His new coworker was already in the driver’s seat of the food truck on Porthos’ first day. He leaned out the side window, blatantly eyed Porthos up and down, and smiled.

“Hey, gorgeous.” That Creole accent sat comfortably under his vowels; and his warm, dark eyes were wicked with interest as he watched Porthos climb into the truck. His mustache was immaculate and twirled at the ends. He had the flung-back, long hair of a guitarist, and the way he slouched in his seat gave Porthos a nice view of the long line of his body.

Porthos grinned back; he could appreciate a player.

“Hey there, never-gonna-stand-a-chance.”

“Oh, never’s a long time,” Aramis gave a saucy wink that shouldn’t have worked, but Porthos was charmed in spite of himself.

Bonnaire showed up near the end of his first day for a meet and greet, but he disappeared within an hour. Porthos could count on one hand the number of times he saw the man after that. Mostly their boss texted them instructions and high-handed lectures. They in turn read the messages and promptly ignored any advice that included the words 'I found this on Instagram'.

Aramis taught Porthos how to navigate the food truck around the French Quarter’s tight curves, and he was introduced and moved onto a first name basis with their suppliers in quick succession. Porthos quickly learned that what Aramis made up for in looks, he surpassed in spades with sheer talent. For all his thick, lovely accent said home-grown, the other man had a culinary resume that circled both the east and west coast, with a frolic through Canada and a shimmy through Mexico.

By the end of his first week Porthos had been fed more tacos than in every previous year of his life combined as Aramis sneaked him samples off their menu. Nearing his first month on the truck, Porthos found himself the happy recipient and taste-tester for Aramis' own ambitiously seasoned creole blackened shrimp, and wondered if he had died and gone to heaven.

His mouth burst with the heat of freshly ground spices and char, and he sucked at the juicy end of a shrimp tail, working out the last remnants of garlic citrus-herb aioli. He looked up from his hands and caught Aramis, crouched on a small plastic stool with his chin in hand, staring at Porthos. His face was an open book of longing and wonder. Only a hint of filthy innuendo in the glint of his eyes, but it paled under the weight of delight as he smiled at Porthos.

“What do you think?” he asked, more demure than he should be allowed, given that cocky attitude of his.

“I think it needs to be on the menu,” Porthos replied, digging out his phone to text as much to Bonnaire. He wished he could say it didn’t sting when he was promptly shot down, but Aramis shrugged it off and urged another shrimp into Porthos’ hand. He didn’t seem concerned with their boss’s opinions.

Bonnaire threw a fit when he saw how much they spent on good ingredients. While they were driving, during prep and service, and at unpleasant hours through the night, their boss would blow up both Porthos and Aramis’ phones with snappy, angry comments on cost and quantity. Porthos felt like he was walking a tightrope, each day ratcheting the anxiety higher inside him every time his phone dinged. Aramis finally took to grabbing his phone and deleting the text messages as they came in, patting reassuring circles into Porthos' back.

“I’ve worked in enough kitchens to know that you need good ingredients for good food,” he told Porthos. “Good food means more customers, more money. Fuck if that man’s gonna circumvent that.”

He bumped shoulders with Porthos and smiled, sweet and caring. “Don’t worry. He’s all bark, no bite. Let me know if he doesn’t leave you alone soon, and I’ll handle him.”

Porthos felt his heart contract in a way that was altogether terrifying. No one ever offered do things for him. Hell, most people never noticed when he was upset—he certainly didn't make it a habit to bury his head in his hands and hope the world would drain away before he looked up again. Although these days he didn't need to look up to know that Aramis would be there.

Porthos let Aramis kiss him three weeks later.

“See,” Aramis said after, leaving Porthos breathless and dazed. “Told you never was a long time.”

Porthos wanted to punch him for that, but kissing him again seemed like a much better idea.

A year later found him and Aramis in the red on rent, despite sales on the food truck steadily rising through the summer. Hurricane season was tough, tourists staying out of the city and locals watching their wallets in case of emergency. Isabelle, a Category 2 that had taken her sweet time trolling the Gulf while deciding where to make landfall, left Porthos fielding constant texts from Bonnaire, who nagged them to not let the food truck get blown away. Two days before rent was due, the hurricane swung east and slammed into Mobile instead, and they could finally get back to their truck.

They worked around the clock, targeting the weekend nightlife crowd eager to stretch their legs after a week of pins and needles and waiting. In the early morning, they set up near a string of bars, hoping to catch the drunks stumbling home.

Porthos kept a running tally as their tip jar filled blessedly higher. Between his bartending experience and Aramis' natural charm, their inebriated customers didn't stand a chance of not parting with some money, but progress was a slow march up a very gradual hill. Most customers were leaving tips, but not many carried cash. Tips from credit cards wouldn't transfer for days, even then they'd lose some of it to transaction fees.

And this would only pay for rent. Payday loomed like an unreachable castle over the distant hills of two more weekends.

Porthos prepped two more spinach wraps, focusing his hands and mind on deft, neat folds. He tried to smile as he handed the food over to two nurses, still in scrubs and having just got off shift. He was so lost in calculating whether moving closer to the hospital would detract from the steady foot traffic from the bars that he hardly noticed that their next customer looked like a freaking lumberjack. In the middle of a southern summer.

The shaggy mountain man grunted out his order. Porthos raised his eyebrows. His attention caught on the impossibly neat line of buttoned flannel and a beard so plush the man must be dying of heatstroke. He had to be a native, Porthos decided, because the idea that a tourist would dress up like a bluegrass yodeler, even in the predawn dark, was just absurd. Just looking at him made Porthos uncomfortably aware of how much he was sweating under his bandana. He shifted, self-conscious as the man's shadowed eyes glinted in patient scrutiny.

Porthos belatedly realized he hadn't said a word in response. He stared back dumbly, and wondered if there was a polite way to tell the man that he didn't speak bear.

“Okay, dude, but let me tell you,” Aramis interrupted, leaning over and blocking Porthos from the other man as he pointed out at the menu. “The barbecue wrap is really good, but we use a lot of sugar in the sauce. That’s probably gonna kill you through the morning while you sober up. Maybe go with something a little lighter? People swear on our portobello veggie, and it's got enough carbs to soak up the alcohol."

Another solid grunt. Porthos couldn’t understand a word of it, but Aramis shot their mountain man a winning smile.

“One portobello coming right up.”

Porthos laid out the spinach, arugula, tomatoes, and pickled red onions. He lined the tortilla, and gave it a good sprinkle of goat cheese, before passing the wrap over for Aramis to handle the portobellos. While Aramis tossed the pan of mushrooms over a flame, while Porthos stirred up the chickpeas. Porthos forewent the pre-made bottle of pesto and readied a light mix of herbs, nuts, and olive oil—he figured he'd be careful with the man's stomach if he was so drunk that words posed a challenge. He was ready to finish the wrap as Aramis handed it back. He neatly bundled it up, and handed the foil over while Aramis ran his credit card.

The man hissed out what Porthos thought might be a ‘thank you’ before stumbling off to eat. Porthos cleaned down the station and made a note on the ingredients chart near the front while Aramis gave his utensils a quick scrub. They were almost out of portobello mushrooms. He dreaded telling Bonnaire that they'd need to restock ahead of schedule.

“Hey,” Aramis murmured, flicking his tongs back to the window. Porthos turned expecting another customer, and instead saw the mountain man sitting on the curb not far from them. His wrap was cradled in his hands, only a few bites missing, but he had stopped eating. His head was tilted up to the night sky with the crazed look of a devotee seeking salvation.

As if sensing their stares, he turned towards them. Porthos recognized the level of intensity he saw on the man’s face. Once upon a time, he had to watch out for that kind of face on bar patrons, knowing it usually meant they were too far gone and itching to pick a fight. On instinct, Porthos rewound through the events of the previous morning's set-up, confirming that he had indeed locked the food truck’s door behind them nearly a day ago.

A day, and they were still low on tips.

Next to him, Aramis waved back at the stranger, because Aramis had the survival instincts of a snail and loved to flirt with danger.

“You made this?” the man called over, voice hoarse like he hadn’t spoken in days. Porthos shrugged, straightening his posture. However this went down, he wanted to appear unflappable and possibly like he could beat this man in a fight if he rushed their truck. Not like he was edging a full day without sleep and could be knocked over by a light rainstorm.

“You watched us make it, buddy,” he barked back. He hoped he looked as intimidating as he sounded.

“I watched you throw some things on a tortilla. Did you do the prep, too?”

“Yep,” Aramis confirmed, smug as ever even with tired bruising under his eyes.

The man stared for a second longer before scrambling to his feet. Slowly, swaying with every other step, he marched his way back over to them.

“This is good,” he deemed. He wolfed down another huge bite of wrap, leaning against the truck to keep his feet under him as he swayed too far forward. His whole body stayed propped against their truck as he ate, chewing with a single-minded intensity. Porthos boggled as the wrap quickly disappeared, bracing himself for the real chance that—drunk as the man was—it would reappear very soon.

Aramis made a discomfited noise in the back of his throat. Leaning down, he shuffled through the belongings stored in the compartment at their feet. He pulled out his personal water bottle, a bright green liter filled to the brim with water. Across the top, his name was written with sharpie in Porthos’ spiky handwriting. He set the container on the window counter and slid it towards their customer.

“Here, man,” he offered. “Looks like you need it more than me.”

Against his better judgement, Porthos felt his heart contract. Aramis had a good soul, always had. Their customer seemed to agree, if his gobsmacked expression was anything to go by. Porthos took pity on him, and plucked one of the food truck’s cards off the window wall.

“Take this,” he instructed. “The link to our app’s on the back. You’ll know were to find us when you want to return it. We'll hook you up with a proper barbecue wrap when you do.”

For a second, Porthos thought the man would refuse both the water and the card. But he reached out a shaky hand to collect their offerings, hooking the water bottle’s looped top with his fingertips and carefully taking the card from Porthos’ hand. “I won’t know when you’re on shift,” he muttered. “Will anyone else working here know you?”

“It’s always us,” Aramis explained with a smile. “Two man band.”

The mountain man nodded slowly, the strange intensity on his face still catching on Porthos’ instincts. He stumbled off after that, muttering to himself between small sips of water. Porthos sent out a quick prayer that the water bottle would make it back. Summer was a swampy hell, and bottled water was expensive.

Their tiny apartment was barely room enough for Aramis, cluttered with his tacky souvenirs and used cookbooks, let alone Porthos. But neither of them minded the close quarters, and Porthos had a meager amount of belongings to pack. Porthos had never dreamed he'd be so comfortable in someone else’s space, but between the food truck and the apartment he could always reach out and touch Aramis. He always answered Porthos’ questing hand, whether with ingredients or a kiss to the creases of his palm. After spending so long without having anything to rely on, knowing that Aramis was always there pushed away the claustrophobia, leaving Porthos feeling nothing but comfort.

They headed home after the mountain man left, and scored only a few hours of sleep tangled together in the narrow mattress. The window was cracked open to catch the early morning breeze off the ocean, and the screen rattling in the frame with each gust. The alarm on Aramis’ phone woke them far too soon, and they drove the truck back out to catch the morning church crowd. There was a small break that morning as Aramis stuck his head into a chapel, hoping to catch a few minutes of the sermon before they were off again, this time towards the Superdome for game day. If they were lucky, the team would do well and fans would be willing to spend money on the high of victory.

Just after the half-time rush, Porthos grabbed his own water bottle from under the counter and opened the side door, letting the small breeze in and taking in the moment of calm. He sat down on the steel grated steps and took a few sips out of the bottle. Then he tossed it over to Aramis. For having grown up around the corner, he'd forget to stay hydrated if Porthos didn't remind him.

“Drink!” Porthos ordered when Aramis pushed the bottle aside. “Do you want a repeat of the last time you passed out?”

“That was once!” Aramis called back. He was using the lull to prep and season more meat. His hair was pulled back into a puffy little pony tail that had Porthos fighting down the impulse to swat at whenever he came close. “And you need it more that I do!”

Porthos grunted and leaned his forehead against the side of the door frame. The humidity of a late August day was inescapable, but just sitting further away from the grill top meant he didn’t feel like his skin was on fire any more, and the steel was just cool enough that it felt good against his face.

The distinctive sound of ice water rattled in front of him, and Porthos cracked his eyes open to see Aramis’ water bottle hanging in front of his face. Behind it was a familiar bushy face and a pair of intense, shaded blue eyes.

“This’ll probably help,” the mountain man said. Porthos took the bottle automatically, blinking in astonishment.

“Thanks,” he muttered. Aramis stuck his head out of the service window and chirped a happy greeting at their visitor. He and Porthos played hot potato with the full bottle of water before Porthos broke down and chugged it first. It tasted divine in the summer heat.

“You look like hell."

“Eh, not the kinda day you wanna be leaning over a grill top. Needed to take a break."

The man hummed in agreement. He stuck out his hand in introduction.

“I’m Athos. I figured from the bottle that he’s Aramis, but…”

“Porthos. Thanks for giving this back,” Porthos said, tilting the bottle. “Definitely not a time when ya' wanna be without.”

Athos nodded, his own face flushed from the heat rising from the tar top of the parking lot. Porthos wondered again how the hell he managed with that shaggy hair and beard.

“You find us alright?”

“Yeah, your mobile app is pretty spot on. You guys have been running nonstop all day, haven’t you?”

“Rent’s due tomorrow,” Porthos explained, only a little defensively.

“No side jobs?”

“Nah. We like what we’re doing.”

Athos nodded. “How much more do you need?”

“$65.83,” Porthos spit out, too frazzled and exhausted to play pretend. He had obsessively tracked over the night and day. Aramis may have kept a vague watch on the money coming in, but Porthos could recite every purchase down to the cent. “Once the game’s over, we’ll head for main street and see what we catch.”

Athos hummed and dug out his wallet.

“Okay. Can I get whatever I had yesterday?”

Porthos winced. “Sorry, out of mushrooms.” He hated admitting how unevenly stocked they were, but pulling money out of Bonnaire for half-way decent ingredients was a constant fight, one that always left Porthos exhausted. After the rent was paid, he supposed they'd fight through another round passive-aggressive, biting texts before they got the money to restock.

Athos hummed, and ran his eyes ran down the menu on the side of the service window. “The Baja wrap?”

Chicken, grilled vegetables, avocados, and a good chipotle ranch, Porthos mentally recited. All ingredients still in stock and in good condition. “Good choice,” he praised, rising to his feet.

Aramis started up the chicken while Porthos pulled out strips of onion and bell pepper out of their containers and tossed the avocados and tomatoes with olive oil, salt, and cilantro. The chicken covered in grated cheese and spicy ranch, and the veg laid over top. Porthos wrapped the whole thing in seconds. Aramis fluttered around him, cleaning up the small mess and getting ready for their next potential order. He was brushing up against Porthos more than strictly necessary, but that was just Aramis.

Once he handed Athos his food, the man traded him for a single, crisp hundred dollar bill. Porthos’ eyebrows shot up. He checked quickly to make sure it wasn't counterfeit, and managed to break it with the bills in the register by the skin of his teeth.

He handed back the change, his hands feeling large and clumsy around the heavy pile of bills and quarters.

Athos took the money, and his intense blue eyes were sharp and calculating between his shag of hair and immense beard. He promptly dumped the handful of bills and coins into the tip jar on the edge of the window.

“Wanna close up early?” he asked, unwrapping the top of the Baja wrap and taking a delicate bite while Porthos struggled to swallow down his shock. “God, this is good. I’ve got some ideas you may be interested in.”

*

Every evening after closing Constance talked to Athos about their profits. He trusted her not to cheat him, but she always insisted that he needed to be more involved, so once the final table left he would strip off his apron and trudge into the front of the house while Porthos and Aramis began their evening clean.

Tonight he slipped into the dining room to find Constance had beaten him to the register, though her posture was weary and slumped. Athos frowned in thought and worry. Constance was a vital part of his staff, just as much as Aramis and Porthos. She had the experience to run the front house like a finely-tuned machine, which was a huge burden off Athos’ shoulders. However, it did make him more aware of her potential to burn-out. He’d need to start looking for more help for her. As he watched her stretch up to reach her day planner from a small, hidden cubbyhole, he noticed she sunken to taking off her shoes. They sat flat, black, and sensible at the base of the host station. Athos wondered if he could convince her they should just go home and talk about it in the morning.

“We had a few walk outs,” she informed him as he came over. “The wait time hit an hour after seven.”

Athos groaned, letting his head fall into his hands. They had stayed busy all night with barely a moment to breathe. It was nearly impossible to think they could have had more orders.

“I’m looking for another chef,” he muttered around his fingers. Constance pursed her lips and gave him a look. She didn’t believe a word of it.

“I’m sure,” she demurred. “But while we’re on the subject, have you had a chance to consider the expansion plans we talked about? Some of this could be helped if we looked at extending the dining room.”

Athos resisted whining into his hands. Why was his entire staff determined to increase their size? Athos remembered working at Le Fronge for nearly a decade out of culinary school, with its three locations and constant, unendingly stressful demands. He still couldn’t remember the dinner service on the night he'd been told he had lost the restaurant’s Michelin Star. He may have been able to claw his way back up, but then Anne had taken a job offer at Versailles, because the loss of the Star had only damaged his reputation. Her ambition was something Athos always admired, until it had bit him in the face.

He didn’t want to return to any of that for all the money and success in the world. Amazingly enough, he was close to happy now with his tiny restaurant in a city too big to remember his name. And his new relationship didn’t quite make sense to him, but it made him smile nonetheless. Why did the real world insist on making him change any of that?

Constance continued tallying the receipts and making notes in her planner while Athos worked on putting his emotions in order. When he came back up for air, she glanced over at him and pushed the planner away.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no’. That’s alright. It’s probably for the best right now."

“Why’s that?”

“Well, not to pile on, but I called Adele to check in with her. She quit over the phone—told me that she wanted to head west and see what she could find out there. I’ve only got a barebones waitstaff tomorrow.”

This time, Athos didn’t bother trying to hide his whine. Being short-staffed in the back was bad enough without the house front staff going for broke as well. Lucy and Emilie were both solid, reliable staffers, but Samara was elbows deep in a Literary degree out of Tulane and could only work part-time around her classes. Jacques was learning, but the boy was so young, and acted more like a busboy than a waiter. He still stuttered when talking to pretty girls, for God’s sake. Serge and One-Eye Florian could be called in to wait in times of need, but their gruff demeanors tended to put customers off their appetites. The men were the only holdover from when Tréville had retired and sold him the restaurant.

“They’ll be able to help,” Athos’ old mentor had told him the day he turned over the keys. “Serge has known every fish supplier in the city since they were kids learning the trade, so they won’t cheat him, and Florian’s bartending skills will put yours to shame. Get your feet under you before you think about retiring them."

Easier said than done, and hardly the worst of his problems. Athos had spent the next month on the brink of panic, out of his mind at the prospect of running a restaurant again, drinking more than he should, and stumbling home just to get a few hours' sleep in a haze of worry and stress. Then, fate had dropped him in front of an odd little food truck during one of his better nights, and his life had changed.

How he had gotten through any of that without Porthos and Aramis was a mystery Athos didn’t want to solve.

At least Adele leaving meant Aramis would no longer flirt with her. She was a sweet girl, but flighty and never seemed to know what she wanted in life. Her wandering spirit called to a similar side of Aramis, and always left him reckless and itching to do things that Athos didn’t think were safe or reasonable.

Porthos wouldn't be sad to see her leave either.

“Want me to handle getting a new waiter?” Constance asked, more for propriety’s sake than anything else. They both knew she’d handle it better than Athos. If fate had granted him Porthos and Aramis, God must have delivered him Constance straight from the heavens. She was the most professional floor manager he had ever worked with, and if he could trust her with his money, he could trust her to handle staffing.

“Yes please,” he muttered gratefully. One day he'd give everyone a raise to make up for this.

*

“This can’t be a good idea,” d’Artagnan complained as he shrugged on his nicest shirt. On the other side of the couch, Constance busied herself with refolding a thin pile of blankets. She plucked a stray throw pillow from the floor and shook it out before adding to the neat stack, fiddling with the fringed corners before she answered.

“It’s a job. With a paycheck and everything. Or do you enjoy crashing on my couch?” She arched an eyebrow, wry and to the point, but d'Artagnan was just grateful that she didn't actually seem fed up with him. After all, it had been years since they had last seen each other in person. His moving in was hardly a gift to her—he'd hated even having to ask.

She had gone quiet over the phone, before she'd kindly asked when he would need to move in and told him he was welcome for as long as he needed and that it would be lovely to see him again.

That was two weeks ago. Now he was sitting in her living room and struggling not to smile as she pretended not to notice that she was packing his bed away for the third time that week. It had become apparent fast that her single bedroom apartment was just a size too small when it came to his belongings, and between the couch and the bathroom she had reorganized almost every possession he owned to try and fit better around hers with little success.

Constance hadn't let that affect how she treated d'Artagnan, even if she was at war with his stuff. She'd been a wonderful and consoling friend since he'd shown up at her door, and at times like these he found himself wanting to just sit back and bask in her familiar presence.

This wasn't his home, but it was probably the closest he'd get to coming home anymore.

“You’re a beautiful, generous soul,” d’Artagnan replied, because she deserved to know it. He dug through his duffel bag for a belt. “Have I told you that lately?”

“Not nearly enough,” she muttered, but her small smile said she was reluctantly pleased. She glanced over to check if he was decent- he had most of his shirt buttons done up. “It’s only for the day, if that helps. One of my waiters decided to go on a quest of self-discovery, and I need an extra pair of hands who knows what they’re doing until I can interview replacements. Do you want it?”

D’Artagnan had about fifty dollars to his name and no real plans now that he had traveled three states to land on Constance's front doorstep. He didn’t think twice.

“I’m on board,” he said, giving her his best smile. He finished rolling up his shirtsleeves and stood up with a flourish, presenting himself for inspection. She reached out and traitorously buttoned his shirt two buttons higher, damning him to the muggy, unfair damp of _January_ without a hint of pity. But when she stood back, she had regained that unhappy, worried pinch between the eyes, which d'Artagnan hated to see returning so soon after the divorce.

He swallowed back his wardrobe complaints with a strained grimace, before realizing that it probably just made him seem ungrateful. He tried to force his face back to something nice and reassuring, that would hopefully show even half the appreciation he felt for her.

Besides, Constance had asked him for a favor. If Constance needed help, he’d never say ’no’.

“Excellent,” Constance clapped her hands together, ignoring his face in favor of her next mission. She walked the short distance from the couch to the small kitchen island, digging into her purse out and pulling out a small portfolio.

“First thing's first,” she said sternly, gently thwacking the portfolio against his chest. “Do your best to memorize the menu. You can’t sell it if you don’t know it.” Then she turned, retreating down the hallway to get ready for work.

“Do you always just have this in your purse?” d’Artagnan teased, but obediently cracked open the menu. The folio itself was made of a stern, black leather—not too ostentatious—and was printed in a simple, elegant font on one large page of stock paper. Neat notations in blue ink danced around the offerings, with sharper black notations circling notes together on the crowded page. On the other inside flap was a stack of receipts and even more notes. For a dizzying moment d'Artagnan's eyes tried to read everything at once, and accomplished reading none of it.

He blinked hard, reminding himself that this was for him and Constance, and focused first on the typed parts of the menu.

He read the menu.

He read it again.

He reached for his phone and worriedly pulled up a web browser. Tentatively, he thumbed in a search for the first entree.

“What’s wrong?” Constance inquired as she emerged from her room, coming over to glance over his shoulder. “I know my notes are a bit all over the place, but it shouldn’t be that hard to read.”

“No, the notes are fine. I’m just looking up what ‘braised’ actually means. And ‘à la nage’." D'Artagnan didn't look up from his phone, determined not to worry her anymore if he already looked that lost.

“But you worked at a restaurant since high school!"

D’Artagnan shot her a guarded look over his phone. “I worked a greasy spoon that was two steps away from an open hepatitis infestation. That's not the same thing, and you know it.”

Constance flicked him in the ear. “But your food prep license is still good, right?”

“Yeah,” Not that it would help him here. Those courses were laughably easy, just fifteen minutes of his life answering common sense questions about food contamination. He reached again for the menu, mentally racing to compare the small print to the easy recipes he'd found on his phone. These weren't diner dishes, they weren't even Olive Garden dishes. He had known, of course, that Constance had quickly found a place in New Orleans as a food manager at some sort of upscale bistro; but now he found himself glancing at her—neat slacks, sensible jewelry and make up, hair tightly pulled back bun—and adding more dollar signs and a stuffier atmosphere to the place she'd described.

Despite the beehive of nerves swarming in his chest, shouting that he was in over his head and making a horrible mistake, he resolved not to let it show. Constance loved her job—and she needed it after fleeing from California. He didn’t want to be the one to ruin it for her.

“That’s fine, we can get you caught up on the rest,” Constance patted him on the shoulder, giving a small huff through her reassuring smile.

Whatever else this restaurant was, d'Artagnan thought, at least it had given her back her self-confidence.

“Grab your comfy shoes, we’re walking.”

“You're kidding.” His shirt would be a damp mess before they made it three blocks.

“Don't underestimate how much I hate driving in big cities. I will walk to work every day of my life, after what I put up with in LA,” Constance sniped as she pulled out her phone, shooting off a quick text. She gathered up her purse and d'Artagnan, holding out her hand to him as she headed for the door.

D’Artagnan sighed and took her hand. He allowed her to pull him out of her apartment, most of his attention still on the menu. Constance led them down a few streets while he tried to match what he had researched with the menu. What the hell was _coq au vin_? He thought it was the chicken one, but maybe he was confusing it with the article about braising. Whatever it was, Constance had penned four stars next to it.

“Okay,” Constance said when her phone buzzed at a crosswalk. “Athos is in early, and he said he’d put a tasting plate together for you. I’ll walk you through the basics before we open for lunch.” She snatched the menu out of his hands—he wanted to read it again—and snapped it closed. “Tell me what appetizers we have.”

“Normandy style French onion soup, bowl or cup,” d’Artagnan recited, his eyes going a little unfocused as he thought. “French lentil salad with bleu cheese. Cajun style crab cakes—those sound really good, by the way. Or seared scallops in…green beans?"

“Steamed brussel sprout leaves,” Constance corrected, “But good job. Entrées?”

“Blackened or grilled catch of the day. How do you know what that is?”

“There are notes in the kitchen, you'll want to memorize them when we get there. I think it’s mahimahi and redfish today. Next entree?”

D’Artagnan made it through reciting the list of entrées without too much stumbling, but still didn’t understand what mahimahi à la nage was supposed to taste like. The desserts were easier; he pulled up a picture of brioche perdu and discovered that it was essentially fancy french toast and fruit.

When they arrived at The Garrison, Constance unlocked the front door and ushered him in.

“Athos?”

“In the back!” a gruff voice called out.

Constance led d’Artagnan through a neat, modern dining room. He had thought himself prepared for this, but the room bled sophistication. Each table was a gleaming, pristine white and laid out with soft, deep blue napkins folded over shining silverware. The walls were halfway paneled in light, delicate wood, and d'Artagnan was strangely reminded of old plantation houses he'd seen on field trips when he was younger. To counteract the darker wood floor, elegant art pieces hung intermittently across the walls, warming the room up while not overpowering the setting. The place wasn't huge, but it was bathed in an elegant light through a few front windows had the warmth of a Sunday breakfast at home.

The menu made sense now. D'Artagnan had never heard of a ‘French inspired ceviche', but if he was sitting in this room, he would gladly trust this restaurant to take all his money and not poison him in the process. Everything here screamed 'attention to detail' and 'lack of health code violations'.

Honestly, he was starting to get excited. The last place he worked at still had ashtrays.

If the front of the house wasn’t impressive enough, the back of the house nearly knocked d’Artagnan off his feet. Clean equipment, an amazing six-flame burner that looked like it work. He knew his standards weren't high, but the floor actually looked swept. Filling in for someone here might actually be pretty great.

Then he looked up.

Constance had told him that there were three chefs that worked the kitchen. She hadn't said they were probably three of the most attractive, imposing men he would ever meet in a kitchen.

“This is d’Artagnan,” Constance introduced, waving to get everyone's attention. “He’s helping out in the front for the day.”

In the closest station, the first chef had a healthy beard covering his chin and cheeks and eyes that pinned d’Artagnan down with a stare that was brief, but felt like sitting in an x-ray. He schooled his face into polite smile. The man nodded at him before returning to plating and arranging food over an array of tiny plates.

Another chef was tucked into the back behind three different stand mixers. Flour streaked over his dark skin and his hair was pulled back behind a colorful bandana, but he waved a hand at d'Artagnan with a warm, welcome smile that flitted across his face the way sunlight floods around a closed curtain. He was at once congenial and unfairly intimidating, muscles bulging through a standard chef's coat as he kneaded a roll of dough.

The last chef, a truly handsome man even in this company, perked up when he heard d'Artagnan's name, but didn’t stop his hands as he manhandled a massive fish. With a silver mesh glove protecting one hand and a wicked knife in the other, his hands quickly broke down the fish in deft, surgical precision until a small army of fillets lined his cutting board. There were fishers on the Panhandle who would weep to watch him skin the meat from its scales. Each action was causally familiar, but d’Artagnan had the scars on his own palms to attest to difficulty of the cuts he was carving were to accomplish. He was stunned despite himself; the man was an artist.

“Ça ça di, nég?” the third chef set down his knife and began wiping his hands on a dish cloth. He looked expectantly at d'Artagnan. And waited.

“Oh. Sorry, I can’t speak whatever that was,” d'Artangan replied with awkward grace. The man stared back, equally dismayed.

“What do you mean you don’t speak French with a name like d’Artagnan?” he demanded, adding an awful flourish on the last vowel of his name. Across the way, the man in flour snorted.

“Neither do you. Last I checked, Louisiana Creole ain't French." The second chef smiled good naturally at d’Artagnan. Then without looking away, he picked up the large mound of dough he'd been kneading in one hand and tossed it into his other hand with a loud **SMACK**. That smile was lethal; it was like being smiled at by a field full of flowers only to find a lion hiding in their shelter. D'Artagnan couldn't tell if the man meant to be polite or intimidating, but he certainly took up a lot of space.

When d'Artagnan had let the awkward silence build too much without answering, the chef dropped the dough with another **THWACK** , and stuck out a powdery hand over the steel worktop.

“Ignore Aramis. He’s just showing off his roots. I’m Porthos.”

D’Artagnan shook his hand, heedless of the flour, then followed suit with Aramis’. He committed their names to memory. He may only be filling in for the day, but he didn’t want to leave them with the impression that he couldn’t be bothered to be polite.

“Constance,” the first chef, who d'Artagnan assumed must be Athos, waved a hand in d'Artagnan's direction. “I think there’s an extra tie in the back.”

Constance made a noise, then eyeballed d’Artagnan again.

“Oh, damn,” she muttered. “I must have forgot about that. Hold on.”

She bustled out the door without further ado, and d'Artagnan didn't have time to follow her because a delicate plate clinked down on the stainless steel countertop in front of him. Athos had materialized a foot away and pointed down at a nearby chair.

"Round one."

D'Artagnan had never seen such clear, morbid glee on someone's face, but the man's sharp eyes and quirked mouth didn't portray maliciousness. Instead they were bright with challenge, so d'Artagnan grabbed the offered silverware and jumped right in.

The cream wasn't strong like a chowder; it added a fresh air to the seafood. D'Artagnan rolled the pieces over his tongue and identified it as scallops and some kind of firm fish. The herbs sat in his mouth after he swallowed, and the small kick of lemon left him feeling light and happy.

"Scallop and mahimahi?" he guessed. Athos hummed, and switched out the plate before d'Artagnan could grab another bite. Damnit, but that was good.

He mixed up the bluefish and the red snapper plates, causing Aramis to recite Dr. Suess rhymes at him. It wasn’t his fault, he thought, since the cuts were similar and the flavors played heavily with tarragon, fennel, and thyme. He battled down his annoyance—he'd only had about an hour to memorized the menu—before he tested both plates again. Another bite of each revealed subtle differences in the texture and the lingering taste of salt and seasoning. The core difference was down to the fish but as he thought about the approach, it made sense that the flavors would need subtle adjustment to set off each entree's side dishes. Very subtle.

Interesting. He quickly snapped up the last few pieces on his fork as Athos whisked his plates away.

The catfish plate was easy to identify and ridiculously hard to stop eating once he started. It tasted like home. He almost stabbed Athos’ hand with the fork when the man tried to take it back before he was finished, but relented in the end when Athos raised his eyebrows in exasperation. Next, d'Artagnan decided that the fennel seed and trout that, while amazingly cooked and plated, wasn't to his personal taste. He thought it tasted too stringy. The following sea bass, the heaviest of the fish given him, jolted him hard in the taste buds.

“Is that ginger and lime?” he asked, startled. Athos raised an eyebrow at him.

“It is,” he confirmed, voice neutral. D’Artagnan chased the taste around his mouth a few more times and nodded. That worked, in an intense sort of way that matched the chef in front of him. Unexpected vibrancy on an already tasty dish.

“Aww, you sore he guessed your moves on the first try?” Aramis said with a cocky grin, still playing with his fish skins and fillet knives. Porthos, his attention on the series of stand mixers in front of him, still took a second to glance up curiously.

“I’m sure you both have better things to be doing,” Athos called. He swapped out d’Artagnan’s plate under the sound of Aramis’ laughter.

D'Artagnan had just started on the jambalaya, which was spicy and thick and flavorful and stuffed with all the things he ever wanted in a jambalaya, when Constance reappeared with a black tie in hand. She shooed him away from his food and to his feet before she looped the fabric around his neck.

“Seriously?” d’Artagnan looked at her in disbelief. "I think I can do this myself, just saying."

“Oh, shut it,” she replied, knotting the tie quicker than he ever would have accomplished. “Now stand up straight.”

He followed her instruction, and she slipped a tiny silver tie clip to into the material, fastening it to his shirt. “Lean over.”

He did so, and she nodded in satisfaction as the fabric stayed close to his body instead of dipping down onto the counter.

“Good. You can go back to what you were doing. I need to do an inventory count.” She was up and gone again in a flurry, leaving d’Artagnan back to the tender mercies of Athos.

For the next hour he remained at the chef's table, eating everything that was put in front of him and occasionally adding to Constance's notes on the menu. Each serving size was tiny, probably so they didn't lose out on their profitability while he happily stuffed his face, but he didn't mind. Everything was delicious, and with his seat at a good vantage point, he was able to see differences between the chefs even when they prepared similar dishes.

Everyone seemed to contribute to almost every dish in some way, whether in prep, construction, or plating. Porthos, who d’Artagnan had pinned as the baker of the bunch, seemed to handle the dishes more out of instinct than technique. Surprising, since watching him bake on-and-off all morning had shown him to be very confidant and self-assured when it came to working his dough. But as lunch and dinner specials were prepped, d'Artagnan saw Porthos taking cues from Athos on prep and presentation. Not that he needed much guidance; only a few directions and the big chef was off like a shot, steel and determination bracing him even though d'Artagnan could see the tense focus in his eyes.

“Change the song!” Aramis yelled across the tiny kitchen when Porthos started wobbling along with an Adele song. He grinned like the Cheshire Cat when Porthos glared and turned the tiny radio above his head up instead.

“Fuck you,” he sang along with the melody. Athos gently tapped along with the next few bars with the hilt of his knife against the stainless steel counter, his mouth doing the closest thing to a smile d’Artagnan had yet seen from him.

Spying on Aramis at his fish station, d'Artagnan could see that he knew more traditional techniques, but he could be put behind a hibachi grill with little change to his performance. His food was flavored heavily with tricks and skills that d’Artagnan had never experienced, and he was impressed to learn Aramis had been responsible for the catfish. Still, the chef flipped his knives casually and often, creating fan-shaped circles in the air, and where the other two moved with haste, he moved like he was practicing for Iron Chef. He had also cut and cleaned more seafood than d'Artagnan thought would feed his hometown, and in less time than it would take d'Artagnan to do the same. He didn't think much of showing off, there was much practicality to it, but the resultant food was astounding and d'Artagnan really missed that catfish.

So the next time Aramis neatly decapitated a fish and twirled his knife through his fingers, d'Artagnan gamely applauded from his tasting station. Aramis gave him a pleased smile.

“Glad I could entertain,” he said with a quick bow.

“How many scars you earn learning that?” d’Artagnan asked. Aramis laughed and showed him a long, silvery one down the back of his hand.

“Yeah,” d’Artagnan replied, rolling up his sleeve to show off one of his own that ran down the back of his arm. “That’s what I figured.”

D'artagnan regretted that a moment later when Aramis' face alighted on him. That was the face of a man determined to hear a the story behind his scar. The man opened his mouth, but a quick smack from Athos brought him back to work before d'Artagnan was asked any awkward questions.

Athos was a chef in the traditional sense that d’Artagnan expected, his food sharp and on point. Where d'Artagnan kept falling under his spell though was in the emotions he brought to his dishes. D'Artagnan had gotten so lost trying to chase each component of that jambalaya that he stupidly ate a shrimp tail without realizing. 

He found himself comparing each new dish to the flavors on that sea bass, which remained hauntingly in his thoughts through the sides menu. D'Artagnan obediently tasted every vegetable placed in front of him, including something that looked like asparagus but exploded with butter and zest and made him want to cry—that was Athos again.

“I'm beginning to suspect,” d’Artagnan commented as he slurped down the onion soup. “That you might actually know how to cook."

“My God, we managed to impress you,” Athos drily replied and snaked his bowl out from under d’Artagnan between spoonfuls, probably in revenge. 

Maybe all the intimidating posturing Athos was doing was a ruse, so that d'Artagnan would be too scared to eat the chefs' out of house and home. If so, it wasn't working—Athos had to wrestle the asparagus plate away all the same, and d'Artagnan scooped the rest of the stalks into his mouth before they were stolen. Athos gave d'Artagnan a glare for his impertinence; d'Artagnan tried to look as innocent as a tie-wearing man with a mouth full of vegetables could look.

The lunch menu came next, mostly the work of Porthos, and the food leaned more towards southern seafood cooking with heavy, biting flavors that made his toes curl. It tasted homecooked, warm in a way that had nothing to do with temperature or spice. d’Artagnan couldn't help flashing back to his home, before everything went to hell. When his mother was still around and his father still alive, and he could curl up on the porch after work and enjoy food made with love. He wondered between Porthos or Aramis which would be the easier one to convince into giving him leftover hushpuppies, the ones that didn’t quite make the cut. Deformed hushpuppies couldn’t be served to customers, but could easily find a home in a broke waiter’s stomach.

Dessert was an exploration of flavors d’Artagnan didn’t usually indulge in. He wasn’t one for sugary things, but all of these desserts were light, fluffy, and sinfully addicting. He mentally apologized to the brioche perdu for calling it a fancy french toast, but didn't apologize to Athos for openly hoarding the little serving plate to his chest as his chased down every last bit of the lavender honey ice cream.

On the next dish, he was fairly sure he made a noise around his spoon. Porthos stopped what he was doing, leaned his fist against the counter, and watched him with a smile on his face.

“Good?” he asked after d’Artagnan gobbled down the small blackberry and lemon tart. Athos had finally given up on taking away his plates. The chef had lined up the rest of the dessert plates and stalked across the kitchen, where he stacked the food prep into the fridge and pretended not to watch.

“So good,” he replied, sad that the portion was so small. It was probably for the best, he needed to be on his feet for the rest of the night and not in a food coma. Damn, the food here was amazing. He licked his lips, and then tried to hide it by wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. It was hard to feel self-conscious though; he had never eaten so well in his life. He felt full and relaxed, almost content. He hadn't felt so good in months, and suddenly the prospect of walking into that beautiful dining room to sell things that made him feel good to other people wasn’t so daunting.

Aramis cackled and gave him a grin sharper than the knife in his hand.

“He’s got good taste, at least,” he dubbed as d'Artagnan rattled off the flavors in the last desert. Athos hummed out another neutral sound, but his eyes tracked d’Artagnan from across the room.

Constance eventually returned, still at a hustle, and began to usher him from his stool. He waved at the three chefs, who at Constance's reappearance had hurriedly gone back to prepping. He began to thank them for the food when Constance pushed him through the door before the words got past his teeth.

"We're running late. Come on now, I still need to show you where your section is."

As they walked by the kitchen anti-chamber and the change-over station, he saw a few white boards. A crisp one hundred dollar bill was taped to the top of the wait staff draw board.

“What’s that for?” he asked. Constance glanced up at it.

“Oh. It goes to the first staff member to sell all the specials for the week. See—,” she did a quick rundown of the board, with each waiter’s name down the left side and numbers to correspond with the specials across the top.

“It has to be all the lunch, dinner, _and_ desert specials to count,” Constance explained. “No one’s gotten it the last two weeks, though.”

"Who am I covering for, again?"

"Adele."

D'Artagnan scanned down the list of names:

**Lucy**  
**Emilie**  
**Jacques**  
**Samara**  
**Adele**

He reached out and scored a finger through her name, then took the marker and jotted down his name. He could definitely use a hundred dollars.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aramis considers life.  
> Athos' day is never done.  
> Porthos feeds their new stray.

CHAPTER 2

_We seek to find God in all things, listen with a discerning heart, and do all things to the greater glory of God._

Aramis never knew why he was moving, only that he needed to.

His culinary education started during his Regency education on the east coast, after a childhood of longing to get out of New Orleans. After not much debate, he'd opted to apply for the Jesuit community in New York, where the Hispanic outreach was better supported, further away from the looming, stifling presence of the south. In Louisiana, his Creole side was seen as charming; his Latino side got him suspicious looks and mocking taunts.

Aramis booked it northeast after high school. Spurred by excitement and the promise of brotherhood, he had hoped that his faith, nontraditional as it came, would see him through the logistics of pledging himself to a lifestyle of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

Besides, his Spiritual Director persuaded him, he would be able to travel, to teach. He'd have a world of social change in his hands, a chance to really do good in the world.

He'd been so young and careless then.

He lasted a year into his Novitiate before realizing that the life of a Jesuit was far too dull, that no amount of prayer had dampened his wanderer's zeal, and that any sense of personal enrichment was quickly becoming lost under the same relentless, itching sea that had washed him out of New Orleans. It took another year to admit it out loud.

Out on his ass and across the country from his nearest relatives, Aramis packed his car and kept heading north.

When he'd been kicked out of his candidacy he'd smuggled out more than a few useful skills under his belt. By far his favorite badge of pride was his time spent in the school kitchens. Burning with the need to prove he hadn't wasted the past two years of his life, he migrated toward local soup kitchens and aid relief. He was seeking some sort of satisfaction in helping others and the reward of doing well for his society; instead he learned how to keep an eye on portion control and how to make a menu stretch.

_Que sera sera._

After that souring insight, Aramis gave up on looking for the light and let himself drift. An adolescence of dreams and ambitions had slipped through his fingers, and the apathy he was left holding weighed him down until he felt he would go crazy if something in his life didn't change. If _he_ didn't change.

So he ditched the hostel he'd been crashing at with a lovely, non-celibate bunkmate. He sold his car for enough money to get a passport and move to Canada, lured by the idea of being able to speak French again without having to march back home in defeat.

Toronto, it turned out, didn't have that many French speaking people, but it had plenty of restaurants. Aramis had little in the way of secular work experience, and reflexively he found himself gravitating back to the kitchen. There he found high staff turnovers, places that were always looking for an extra pair of hands that wouldn't slice a finger off during prep, and people that appreciated what a quick study he made. He landed a job within a week of moving; and for housing, he found an older woman with an out-of-town husband who could use the rent as well as his company.

It was even easier in Montreal, where he finally found the French-speakers, who found his Creole-French accent ludicrous but charming. The restaurant he landed in catered heavily to tourists, but he was able to gorge on cheese curds and tourtière, and he learned the fattiest and most decadent things that could be done to smoked veal. Plus, he had a knack for ingratiating himself with the more experienced chefs. Soon he'd collected a pretty pile of used, notated cookbooks, and he started splurging up to a third of his paycheck down at the fish markets.

Aramis also spent a third of his time below deck on a rotation of fishing boats, mostly introduced to him under the guise of 'private tours'. After years of pledging himself—denying himself—it shouldn't have been alarming how hard up he felt for a little companionship. At work, cooking was sustaining, engaging. He felt wooed, standing over an oven for hours at a time, like he could grow into a whole new person. But stepping outside at the end of the day, the rush would drain away and all that stayed with him was a pressing, urging neediness. Shaken up, fizzing and overstimulated in his skin and ready to explode at the right touch. He didn't struggle for attention, vainly ensured it with his grooming habits, but it worked against him because once he started saying 'yes', he worked himself up into a frenzy.

So boats. A lot of boats, owned by a lot of fishermen, in lieu of staying in an actual apartment or, God forbid, making a real home.

Not the most romantic of set-ups, but certainly a good remedy to a few hard years of self-enforced virtue.

Aramis spent the next six months in Quebec, and it was the longest he'd spend in one place for the next few years.

He saw the world, on his terms. It wasn't the structured traveling he'd had in mind when he left home, but a pattern emerged all the same: he stuck around long enough to pad his bank account, make some new friends, and see the sights. He came, he cooked, and he left, usually without much fanfare.

When he got lonely or felt particularly ardent, he found someone interesting to ward it off. People were never sad to see Aramis go. He was an easy guest to bring to a party, but by morning the thrill would wear off and he'd be that strange guy someone's roommate had brought home, something less than a house-guest since they knew he'd be out of the city soon. The stigma of the traveler. His memories were always kinder and easier to maneuver than the real experience of being sidelined, so he just strapped himself in and enjoyed the ride while he could.

So Aramis wandered, sticking close to the coastlines as he circled the country. He took pictures, collected mementos, sent cheap, tacky postcards to his parents, and he learned to cook. Some days it lingered, the nagging feeling that he had wandered too far off his God-given course, but as he worked his way through the grills and the bistros, each kitchen felt like a renewal, like he was relearning how to walk after his feet had fallen asleep years ago. Inevitably though, the fresh, young love of it would fade: the chefs he worked with would seem less innovative and more pretentiously petty, and his skin would start to itch. Time to move on.

Homesickness crept up on him over the course of years. He tried to outrun it, wound all the way up in Alaska and dipped down as far as Panama, only to find himself curving back up to Texas, where he found a torta ahogada so spicy that it would make his late abuela cry. Instead he sat in his car with the sun hot on his face, tear-stained but with his hands covered in hot sauce, and he thought hard about his life.

Aramis could clean a catfish in fifteen seconds, roll out a perfect pasta dough without much thought, and even distill his own moonshine. He just couldn't find a direction he wanted to head in next. Couldn't find peace within himself, to know if any of his exploits had actually accomplished anything worth being proud of.

He sucked it up, curved right, and landed back in New Orleans almost a decade after leaving. Everything felt familiar—the smell, that pervasive heat, the noise of the traffic—but it was like someone had takien a photo from his mind, shook up all the pieces, and set them back in place hoping he wouldn't notice. For all his family roots ran deep through the town, it didn't feel like home anymore. He could have kicked himself for thinking it would.

Down and unmotivated, with a drained bank account and credit card charges that covered five countries, Aramis took the first job he was offered. He figured he’d work in Bonnaire’s run down little food truck until he had enough money to move, maybe on to Florida.

Then he found Porthos.

Porthos had the kindest, deepest eyes he'd ever seen. He had a great laugh and a sharp sense of humor that could keep Aramis running circles for hours. He also had beautiful hair, and a smile that nailed Aramis’ feet to the floor.

Aramis knew he wanted him within the first two minutes of meeting him. The desire that hummed through him wasn’t the distracted rushing, burning that he so easily fell into around people he wanted. Porthos had such a strong sense of self that it anchored even Aramis to the ground, and together they rolled through the city like a freight train. For the first time, Aramis felt just as invigorated by the person he was cooking next to as the food he was cooking.

Oh, dios mio, the _food._

Aramis loved to cook, enjoyed the skill and dexterity needed and the pride that came with creating something amazing. But now he also wanted to cook for Porthos. He wanted to feed Porthos, to impress him, in a way that had nothing to do with seduction—mostly.

The last time he'd been through New York, he'd worked alongside a chef named Marsac, who had opened Aramis’ eyes to what food could do to a person. Porthos made Aramis want to actually utilize those lessons. It was terrifying, but Aramis was never one to questions his impulses.

Part of it, he knew, was that he was a shameless flirt and he fed off of Porthos’ thrill each time Aramis put a dish together for him. Porthos' eyes lit up like little candles, and he tasted everything Aramis offered with curiosity and joy. Porthos wasn't self-conscious about enjoying his food either, pleasure shining over his expressive face in a way that was just indecent. Just watching him made Aramis feel weightless and fuzzy. After the first few times, Aramis gave up the notion that he was just giving Porthos a taste of the food truck's menu, though he did worry that flirting through food might be too subtle.

But maybe subtle could be good, Aramis considered, watching Porthos taste-test a new shrimp dish he'd packed for lunch. The recipe had turned out spicier than intended, but Porthos made quick work of the whole bowl. It was nice, how willing Porthos was to indulge Aramis' newfound obsession for foisting food upon him. He was a good guy. Porthos hadn't even held it against him when Aramis had lazily propositioned him on his first day of work. He was attentive when Aramis spoke, like he thought he'd be quizzed on it later, and it made Aramis want to blurt out every weird, scandalous thought that crossed his mind. They'd barely known each other for a month, but Aramis was already a master at navigating the space around Porthos in their cramped food truck, trading verbal parries and dodging elbows and pans like a pair of well-seasoned dance partners.

Maybe subtle plus waiting could work.

He didn’t mind the slow game. Porthos had the kind of reactions that Aramis had lived for when he had first moved in with Marsac, only better. Marsac had piqued Aramis' interest with his easy friendship, then bulldozed him with his eagerness when Aramis agreed to move in. He was cordial and genuine, but Aramis had mistaken his fervor for passion, both in the kitchen and the bedroom. Instead of igniting into the inferno Aramis could have happily cooked himself in, they had fizzled out.

To look at Porthos now was to see the ghost of the early days with Marsac, all stolen casual touches and easy banter. Heady with delight, laughing too hard at dumb, shitty jokes. Except Porthos didn't ignite and fizzle. Porthos stood, a whole solid wall of himself, next to Aramis' day after day, and every day he only grew more into his own skin. Every single day, Aramis got to meet his new best friend all over again.

When they finally kissed, he could taste his flavors on Porthos’ tongue and his brain must have short circuited in that moment, because it would take Aramis months before he'd realize that he had stopped looking for an excuse to pick up and head to the next city.

In contrast, leaving Bonnaire’s tiny food truck behind wasn't a hard choice. Aramis had never enjoyed it, found it far too claustrophobic and isolated for a kitchen. By the time they left he hated it, loathed the paintjob and the counter and even the equipment, if for no other reason than Porthos was unhappy there. The never discussed it, but Aramis had seen some of the texts Bonnaire had sent back in reply to Porthos' suggestions for improving things: Be grateful. Know your place.

Aramis was convinced Bonnaire had never shown his face back at the truck because he knew Aramis planned to beat him bloody at the first provocation. Probably because Aramis hadn't bothered to hide his frustration, even through text message. Still, it was maddening; his Porthos was unstoppable, and the fact that this piece of gravel in the road could halt him where he stood simply because he signed their paychecks- Unacceptable.

He hadn't noticed when Porthos walked off with his heart, but it was obvious by that point that he was snagged and never getting released. Aramis couldn’t say he minded; he thrived better at Porthos' side than he ever had alone.

He figured they’d save up enough to buy the food truck away from Bonnaire, get the man out of their lives, and work on New Orleans street corners for rent and food money. Aramis didn't have a head for numbers like Porthos did, but surely between the two of them they'd make it work.

Then Athos stumbled upon them, and suggested a whole new kind of freedom.

Porthos was a treasure to cook for, but Athos had the kind of palette Aramis craved. Even drunk off his ass, he was able to dissect and recognize every flavor, infer each technique Aramis used. He was a challenge, and Aramis so very much loved a challenge.

“St. Louis rib,” Athos pulled apart the barbecue sandwich, a specialty Aramis picked up in Lexington. “Marinated for at least two days. You used white wine vinegar in the sauce for the acid. Brown sugar, honey, cumin. Is that coriander?”

Aramis hummed, trying to keep a straight face as Athos’ snub of a nose twisted up in thought.

“Orange peel,” Athos finally decided. “And bourbon. White pepper.”

Aramis let his smile break through. He couldn't resist.

“I camped out in Kentucky for a couple of months a few summers back,” he admitted. “They make it strong and slow up there.”

“Ever consider using molasses?”

“Funny you should ask that. Molasses and I have a history when it comes to baking, so brown sugar is the closest I come to using it these days,” Aramis smiled his best disarming smile.

His best clinked off of Athos' armor as the man continued to stare at him. Deadpanned. Handsome. Waiting.

He was chagrined at having to admit it but he knew there were places his skill level fell through.

“I always burn molasses. Every damn time.”

Athos raised an eyebrow at him. “I have that issue too, sometimes. Candy thermometers were invented for just that reason. It burns at 250 degrees.”

“That’s the temp for hard candy, in’nit?” Porthos asked. He was sat next to Athos and busy pouring over their notes for the menu. Aramis startled, the bubble between him and Athos popping, but then flicked a proud smile his way; Porthos learned in leaps and bounds and retained information like a sponge.

“Yes,” Athos confirmed. “I hated that part of culinary school, but yes.”

Aramis watched Athos use a knife and fork—really?—to compose a perfect bite of pulled pork and coleslaw. Porthos cleared his throat and asked:

“'Is just candy you don't like, or all desserts?”

Athos settled his gaze on Porthos as he bit into his food. He was a hard man to read when he was thinking; all Aramis could be certain of was that he was giving Porthos' question the full consideration it deserved.

“All of them. We can hire out a pâtisserie after a few months if we’re still on our feet. Until then I figure sorbets, cookies, and the occasional chocolate cake shouldn’t ruin us.”

Porthos hummed. Aramis finally yanked his focus from Athos, who had moved on to tasting the coleslaw on its own (“celery seed,” he finally decided, much to Aramis’ amazement), to Porthos, who wasn't looking at either of them. Porthos had his attention to the ground and was absently kicking at his work pack. His fists were clenched tight. When he noticed he was being watched, he lifted his head to meet Aramis' gaze and made the same strained humming noise. That was Porthos for, 'I want to say something but don't think I should’. Aramis had heard it a lot when Bonnaire was around.

Unlike Bonnaire, Athos picked up on it too.

“Yes, Porthos?” His eyes could cut glass, and he knew it too. He pinned them on Porthos and waited. Porthos’ mouth twisted to the side as he tapped at the counter with his pen.

“Well,” he finally muttered, struggling but meeting both their gazes, his shoulders back like no-big-deal. “If that’s the plan, I was maybe thinking I could give it a try.”

Aramis wanted to instantly sign off on the idea just to encourage that spark in Porthos, but he bit his lip and reigned himself in. Athos’ restaurant, he told himself. Athos’ decision.

Didn't mean he couldn't push the odds in Porthos' favor.

“Hallelujah,” he smiled his most charming, down-home smile full-tilt at both men, hoping to declare victory before Athos could shoot them down. “God didn’t gift me with the patience for baking. What d'ya say, Athos?”

Athos wasn't fazed and his gaze stayed locked on Porthos. His face was inscrutable, but Porthos didn’t back down, and met him with his own open, determined expression. It was odd that Aramis would feel like a voyeur, watching his boss and his boyfriend stare each other down.

“Alright,” Athos agreed. “Bring me some ideas tomorr—,” he didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence when Porthos reached down to his bag, pulled out a notebook. and flipped it open. His hands shook a bit as he tore a few pages out, but the set of his shoulders was pure steel. He quickly circled half a dozen options and pushed the pages over to Athos.

“Those might work."

“That’s what you’ve been doing over at Alice’s,” Aramis cawed, his eyes widening with glee. He knew Porthos had been sneaking off to the lovely Alice's shop during the last few months, but he hadn't been known it was for this.

“Alice?” Athos questioned as he picked up the first recipe for review. His fingers played at his lips while he read, and Aramis hoped he realized the gift he'd been handed.

“The bread and wrap supplier we used on the truck. She opened up a bakery near here a while back, and Porthos always lent her a hand when we stopped by in return for a discount.”

“She let me tinker around in her kitchen on our days off,” Porthos admitted, a faint blush over his cheeks. Aramis thought it was adorable and only just restrained himself from dragging Porthos across the counter and scattering kisses over his face. Bless Alice, she too saw how much potential Porthos had.

“So, I was thinking maybe the tarte au citron, the chocolate-orange rice pudding, the salted-caramel cookie with honey ice cream?”

Athos flipped through Porthos’ recipes, making his own notes in the tiny margins. He pushed it back with a few others annotated.

“Make me those too. They look interesting, especially the passion fruit eclairs.”

Porthos looked over the ones Athos annotated and his face lit up with an excitement that Aramis couldn't help but echo, grinning madly at the new boss.

“Come on over tonight for a tasting?” Porthos offered. “I have most of what I need at the apartment.”

He shot Aramis a questioning look while he made the offer, as if he belatedly remembered that their apartment was a shared space. Nonetheless, Aramis was on board. It would be a tight fit but he was already used to that with Porthos, who took up space like light took over a room. They hadn’t known Athos long but they had cooked a few practice runs with him, and he maneuvered between them like a true professional.

Besides, it would only be Porthos doing the cooking—Aramis could move one of their chairs for Athos to sit on at one end of the kitchen, which was basically a hallway, and then Aramis would just stand behind Athos all night. Easy. Transplanting to their tiny apartment shouldn’t be too challenging. Lord, though, it was tiny.

Aramis wasn't ashamed of his living situation. For the past few years, he'd slept in his car more often than not. Comparably, his and Porthos’ shared apartment was downright luxurious.

He tried to remind himself of that when Athos turned the corner into their kitchen and stopped dead in his tracks. Aramis came to a halt behind him, ready to stop Porthos if this went south. He could feel Porthos hovering at his shoulder. It had been his idea, and when Aramis glanced back at him he seemed calm, but Aramis didn't doubt that he'd push back if he felt he was being looked down on.

Aramis just hoped he wouldn't be disappointed with Athos.

Meanwhile, Athos inspected their apartment like a landlord looking to hold on to their deposit. He ran his hands across the cracked linoleum edges of the counter and inspected the charred burners on the range top—which worked fine, Aramis thought defensively, that was just how the stove had come and no amount of scrubbing was gonna make it look cleaner than it was.

Then Athos looked in the oven, and while his face didn’t fold up in disgust, disapproval did flash through his eyes. Aramis was already gearing up for a fight—Porthos took damn good care of that oven—when Athos turned to them to pass his verdict.

“No."

“No?” Aramis challenged, and something in his tone must have broke through Athos' thick skull to make him realize he was being an ass, because his eyes widened and he lifted his hands in a placating gesture.

"It's too small." God, he was really going to spell it out, wasn't he? Did the man have no self-preservation? "You wouldn't have enough burners at once, let alone the oven space, not for the amount of baking we'll need to get done."

Porthos shouldered past Aramis and stared Athos down.

"So 'll just cook 'em one after another, then."

Athos blinked in surprise. "Really?"

"Why not?"

"That'll take you all night. We have prep in the morning."

"I ain't adverse to hard work," Porthos scoffed.

Athos grinned, his eyes bright and enlivened for the first time since he'd swooned drunkenly against their food truck. It was so out of left field, Aramis felt the fight slip out of him.

“You can’t cook in this kitchen. Let’s go.”

“Where?” Aramis asked, only a little stinging and annoyed. He nudged Porthos in the side as he passed, checking to see if he was alright, and got a helpless shrug in return.

Athos seemed to have a plan now, and the shift in his mood was dramatic as he began investigating their cabinets. Their boss searched through their cupboards until he found a stash of plastic grocery bags balled up in a drawer.

"We're going to my place," he explained, almost giddy as he shook out a bag and began grabbing the ingredients Porthos would need with unerring accuracy. "I've got more space and two ovens, so even if Porthos does it all himself it should take half the time. And we can push prep back a few hours in the morning. No use burning you two out before we even hit opening day."

That was more generous than Aramis expected, almost enough that he could ignore the fact that their boss was a madman who was rudely shuffling through their stuff.

Porthos pushed past him, grabbed his own bag, and started packing up ingredients too. Aramis jumped in after.

If Aramis and Porthos’ apartment was luxury, Athos’ was downright nirvana. He'd known from seeing the equipment at the restaurant that their boss was more well-off than his bluegrass chic clothing let on, but the place he was leading them to was a ways from the restaurant, in the penthouse inside a set of antebellum buildings. Aramis’ eyebrows crept up his forehead as they went further into the neighborhood and he slowly realized that they weren't just passing through, _this is where Athos lived._ These were the kind of homes that would never be caught dead possessing wine bottles with screw tops, and would also look down on him for owning some himself.

Beside him, Porthos shrunk in on himself, his shoulders coming up around his ears as he tried to make himself smaller and less threatening looking. Aramis wanted to reach out and reassure him that the fuckwads living here had nothing on him, but with Athos nearby he settled for a lingering pat on the shoulder.

Two steps into Athos’ apartment and whatever comfort there was in being out of eyeshot from the neighbors was replaced with a level of shock that rounded all the way back to total numbness. Aramis saw what Old Money looked like when he lived in DC, and he recognized it now. This wasn’t a ‘we hit it big in the real estate market before the crash’ kind of place. This was ‘my family owned a plantation before the war’ kind of money. All the furniture was old, heavy wood with not a drop of a modern aesthetic to be found. Aramis ran his hand along the leather couch and shuddered; it had to be real, because he had felt nothing like it before. He suspected that nothing in the place was less than a hundred years old.

Except the kitchen, he mentally corrected when he saw it. His jaw dropped, actually dropped, and he was glad for Porthos' sudden grip on his elbow. Off in the distance he could hear the faint echoes of sermons against material possessions. Then he turned to look at Porthos, who had transformed from guarded to gleeful between the door and the kitchen, and smiled.

“Why do you need this much space?” Porthos asked, agog. He drifted into the kitchen and let his fingers skate over the stainless steel range top and the stacked ovens. The granite counter tops. The custom, dark-stained cabinets.

Athos, busy with unpacking their supplies in a graceless pile across the counter, just shrugged. “It’s been in the family for generations. I figure better to use it than let it sit in dust and neglect.”

“This _kitchen_ hasn’t been in your family for generations,” Aramis muttered, as he mentally reconsidered that this wasn't even a regular apartment. He watched as Athos tossed expensive saucepans out of the cabinets and kicked the sleek wood doors shut behind him.

Fuck it, Aramis decided, and he jauntily boosted himself up onto one of the counters of the large island. This place was lovely but there was only so much deference he could muster up. Athos shoved at his hip on the counter, but it was only to reach a drawer with some dishtowels. While Aramis couldn’t quite shake the unnerving flustering of how much wealth Athos actually had, it was reassuring to know that it didn't erase the shaggy, plaid-wearing lumberjack who had stumbled into their life.

“I may have modified some things when I moved in,” Athos admitted. He almost looked bashful behind his beard.

“And when was that?”

“After I left my last job,” Athos didn't explain any further. He pretended to be engrossed with laying out ingredients for Porthos, who crouched down to inspect one of the ovens.

“Don’t drool too much,” Aramis warned. “The Lord himself only knows how much of your soul you’d need to sell to pay for anything you break.”

Porthos hummed in agreement, but his eyes were wide and excited. Athos brushed a casual hand over Porthos’ shoulder and cracked a small grin when Porthos glanced up.

“Feel free. It’s made to be used,” he said. Porthos needed no other encouragement. With a rakish smile of his own, he popped the oven open. Aramis could see the shiny interior from his seat, and whistled in appreciation, the quality of the unit bowling him over. This was the kind of set-up he only dreamed about, better than most of the restaurants he'd worked in could boast. Athos raised an eyebrow at him.

“It’s a Wolf DF304 gas range,” he said noncommittally, with a playful glint in his eyes that said he knew exactly what he was doing to Aramis. “Two oven pits with blue porcelain interior and ten modes, including convection. Cast iron burners with 20,000 BTUs—it can boil water in about a minute.”

“You’re a cruel man,” Aramis accused. Athos gave him a sly look and strutted across the kitchen. He opened a large floor-to-ceiling cabinet, and Aramis considered slapping himself when he saw it was the door to the refrigerator. The unit itself started at the ceiling, and soft, white light filtered down to shelves laden down with dream-worthy ingredients all the way to the floor.

“Built-in, custom paneled, Viking refrigerator, with two deli compartments, four humidity controlled produce drawers, and better energy efficiency rates than most nuclear power plants.”

Aramis was sure he would have continued, showing off every neat feature and jaw-dropping gadget to Aramis' delight, but Porthos had cheerfully ignored them while he performed his own explorations for tools and began measuring out ingredients. He chose that moment to kick on a cobalt blue stand mixer, grinning with undisguised glee as the motor churned. Opened bags of sugar, flour, brown sugar, and empty stick butter wrappings were already scattered around him.

“I love these things,” he yelled over the noise. His grin was wide as he flicked the motor’s gear higher. Aramis snorted, the apartment's spell broken in the face of a man who could outshine even these lavish surroundings.

“You should bring over that bottle of Viognier I see in there,” Aramis ordered, switching back to Athos to point toward the wine bottle resting in the fridge door. “How do you not have a wine cooler? This kind of kitchen deserves a wine cooler.”

“You’re sitting on it,” Athos explained as he grabbed the bottle and snagged three glasses from a nearby cabinet. Aramis glanced down; his calves rested against yet another stainless steel block built into the counter. He tapped his heels gently against the door as Athos hopped onto the counter next to him. He handed over the glasses and made to pour Aramis his glass before realizing he hadn't opened the bottle.

Athos mumbled an emphatic 'fuck', and leaned over Aramis’ lap to pull open the drawer on the far side of his thigh and dig out a corkscrew.

The motor across the kitchen abruptly cut off.

“I didn’t think this through,” Porthos grimaced into his mixing bowl. “I needed to mix another base first.”

“See that panel on the left?” Athos asked. He handed an alarmingly full wine glass to Aramis. “Lift the front up.”

Porthos did, and Aramis wasn’t surprised to see a second stand mixer, this one a shiny silver. Porthos turned to stare at Athos.

“Was it too much effort to just buy another bowl for the first one?” he asked in disbelief. Athos shrugged and took a long sip from his wine. Porthos rolled his eyes, but snagged Aramis’ own glass for himself, chugging half the glass in one go. Athos offered his glass to Aramis in replacement, and filled up the final glass for himself.

“There’s a proving drawer down next to your feet if you need it," Athos made a 'cheers!' gesture towards the vicinity of Porthos' knees.

“Of course there is.”

Aramis chugged his own glass, and held it out for a refill.

By the early morning, the counter was scattered with cooled and half-eaten baked treats, the sink was filled to the brim with dirty dishes, and they had finished the Viognier.

“Ugh,” Aramis muttered, rubbing his hands across his face. They hadn't saved much time even with the bigger kitchen. Now he was stuffed with sugar and just tipsy enough to not care if he kept himself together. Walking home was going to be hellish.

“Just crash here,” Athos said, like he had read Aramis' mind. Aramis peeked at him through his fingers.

“I said that out loud?”

“Yes.”

Aramis groaned again. He knew drinking on an empty stomach was a bad idea, but he had done it anyway, because watching Porthos have the time of his life with Athos' equipment had driven him stupid. Athos had kept Aramis company on the counter through the evening while he chatted Porthos up with talk about sugar working techniques, and asking about the kinds of assignments he'd had in culinary school. Porthos unwound while he did his thing. He'd been tense since Athos had stepped foot into their apartment, but the more he withstood Athos' probing, the more he teased Athos about having more baking equipment than baking sense. Aramis let himself drift on good wine and company, something in his chest coming loose.

The pleasant vibe, which had carried him through helping Athos taste-test and had convinced him to eat most of the bread pudding on his own, was draining fast now that he was staring down the possibility of crashing at his boss's place.

“You wouldn’t mind?” Porthos asked. He looked pink around his cheeks—Aramis wanted to kiss him stupid.

“Not at all. I’ve got two guest rooms, and the cleaning staff makes sure the sheets are clean.”

Oh. Aramis glanced up again, and very deliberately kept his mouth closed, even through his fuzzy mind. They had tried to reign it in, new place of employment and all, and they really hadn't gotten around to _telling_ Athos. More to the point, Aramis hoped that in the face of his and Porthos' staunch professionalism, Athos would just wave off any personal, romantic interaction they had. But was Athos so oblivious he didn’t even notice? Did he think they were just roommates?

Also, Athos was rich enough to have a cleaning staff. Aramis barely resisted biting back the groan that rumbled up his throat. That was surreal.

Aramis realized he hadn’t said anything. Porthos looked at him, eyebrows raised. Rather than trust his mouth, he nodded.

“We’d appreciate it,” Porthos replied for them both. Athos nodded and pointed them down the hall. Aramis waited, hovering in the doorway of his own room until Athos disappeared into the other side of the apartment. Then, he slipped into Porthos’ room.

“‘m I about to be ravaged?” Porthos asked. He was halfway through pulling off a shirt and a delicious line of skin was bared above his jeans. Aramis didn’t bother answering. He grabbed onto Porthos’ shirt collar, dragged him down, and kissed him deep. Porthos moaned and cupped the back of Aramis’ neck, clinging close to him. When they parted his face was well and truly flushed, and his curls mussed up from Aramis' hands. Aramis was already daydreaming of ten minutes down the road, of his face buried in the crook of that neck to drown out the noise and sweat-slicked bodies pressed together, when Porthos had to break the mood.

“Are we gonna tell him?” he croaked. Aramis’ face scrunched, annoyed and unsure with himself even as he pulled away. It was a dilemma he didn’t want to think about, not after they'd had such a good evening.

“He’ll figure it out soon enough,” he reasoned. He had to; Aramis and Porthos weren’t what could be considered subtle. It was just the stress of the soft opening demanding Athos’ attention. Once that was gone he would realize without them having to do the awkward ‘two of the three people on the line are sleeping together’ conversation. Aramis could show Athos that it wouldn't matter. He and Porthos could be professional and focused without bringing their personal life into the kitchen.

He didn’t want their relationship to be the excuse that ruined this. Athos was brilliant and obviously capable of greatness, and Aramis wanted for Porthos and himself to be a part of it. After all, this was the kind of opportunity that could give Porthos the recognition and the freedom he deserved.

They slept in separate rooms that night. Aramis couldn’t say he was a fan of the situation, and he sulked in the hallway after Porthos shooed him out the door, but sometimes even he could bow to pragmatism.

Watching Athos cook up huevos rancheros the next morning was his reward. It'd been too long since he'd tried someone else's take on them, and he was delighted to watch Athos cook something so intrinsically _homey_ and, well. Not French. If he was uncomfortable cooking outside his wheelhouse, he didn't show it, cracking eggs with one hand while he threw together a homemade salsa. Soon the kitchen was filled with the warm aroma of stewing tomatoes and garlic and chilies. It was heaven.

It didn’t stop him from needing to steal a kiss from Porthos at the first opportunity presented, when Athos’ attention was turned towards the refrigerator.

Porthos made a face, either at his audacity or his morning breath, but let it slide with a wink and a barely concealed smile. He scooted his chair closer, and Aramis counted it as a win.

He should have gotten used to sleeping alone over the next few days. Their soft opening loomed large at the end of the month, and Athos ate little and slept less. Following him home and forcing food into him seemed like the only way to keep their boss alive, which meant back to their separate bedrooms. Aramis had to satisfy himself with only kisses and sneaking his fingers under the give in Porthos’ clothes.

“Stop,” Porthos groaned when one night Aramis let his fingers dip down into his jeans rather than up and under his shirt. “Or I’m gonna make you finish, and we ain’t got time for that.”

Aramis grumbled, but agreed. If he were honest, he probably didn’t have the energy for sex anyway. He was dreaming in fish cuts and spice combinations these days. His hands were developing new calluses, and he had tiny pockmarks across the back of his hands from a temperamental fryer they hadn’t gotten around to replacing. He had tasted more recipes in the last few weeks than the last six months on the food truck. Sleep became a longed-for, but never achievable, goal.

Their soft opening went well enough, but Aramis felt brought up short every time service ended. They had only opened half the dining room, and it never felt like enough. Athos, still learning how to communicate with them in the kitchen, stared down at their orders and tried to find the pattern between them. Anything to crack the code and make them more efficient. Eventually, Porthos had to physically wrestle him away. Aramis had the taxi waiting, and they all but threw Athos into the back to get him home.

Opening night came in the blink of an eye two weeks later. Not the soft opening, not any sort of rehearsal, but real, loud, insane opening night. Aramis lost himself in Athos’ call outs, his knife becoming an extension of his wrist and hands as he worked. Prep, cook, taste, plate, and keep communication open. Rinse, repeat.

It was the most focused and intense service Aramis had ever served, and he'd never felt so alive.

“That’s it!” Athos called, breaking through Aramis’ reverie. “We’re done!”

Porthos let out a breathless, giddy laugh.

“Did we rock it?”

Athos grinned.

“We rocked it.”

Porthos cheered, tossing his cleaning towel into the air in celebration. Athos was over the moon. Success looked good on him; he kept turning to smile at them, pride shining in his face. He even wrapped his arm around Porthos in a half-hug, and came over to clap his hand around Aramis' neck as he rounded the prep station.

Aramis let out a disbelieving giggle, so high on adrenaline he had to lean forward to put his weight against the counter, only to feel sharp pain bite through his palm. He jerked back, cursing and waving his hand to get rid the throbbing sting. He must've burnt himself during service.

Athos was drawn back to his side by his colorful language. He grabbed Aramis by the wrist and pulled it close to his face. The skin around his thumb was red and shiny, but it wasn't blistering. Aramis tried to wrench away when Athos probed it.

“You’ll be fine. Just make sure you dress it right.” With that proclamation, Athos dropped his hand and left the kitchen, heading for the front of house.

While Aramis ran cold water over his hand and wrapped a towel around an ice pack, Porthos opened the back door to let the night air in. He settled down on the stoop step, bracing his elbows on his knees as he untied his bandana. Aramis came over to press his knee against Porthos’ spine, smiling gently as Porthos dropped his head back to rest against his thigh.

“You good?” he asked, bracing his burned hand and ice pack against his chest as he reached down to run his fingers through Porthos’ curls.

“Yeah,” Porthos turned his face up to him.

Aramis’ heart constricted. Porthos' looked so damn alive, his eyes burning and bright. The flush across his face made him glow, and Aramis only had so much self-control left. Leaning down, he dropped a kiss on Porthos’ forehead, his nose, down to his mouth.

“Oh.”

Porthos tensed under his hand, and a shockwave rattled down Aramis’ spine.

He turned around, surprise locking his throat. In the front of the kitchen stood Athos, first aid kit bundled under his arm and a tube of anti-burn ointment in hand. The silence between them hung weird and heavy, beating all the post-service exuberance out of the kitchen. Athos looked stunned, his eyes the widest Aramis had ever seen them go, in the worst possible way.

Fear flooded Aramis’ system, and he said the only thing he could think of:

“Could you give us two seconds?” he asked with a brilliant, phony smile.

Athos nodded woodenly.

“Thank you!” Aramis replied, then promptly shut the kitchen door behind him. Porthos hadn’t moved, barely looked like he was breathing. Definitely panicking.

“This is bad, ain’t it?” he whispered. Aramis grunted, his knees creaking as he wobbled taking a seat down next to him.

“Maybe,” Aramis acknowledged. “But, then again, maybe not.”

“Did you just close the door in his face?"

“…Yeah. I did.”

“Probably shouldn’t’ve done that.”

“Yeah. You good?”

“Yeah.”

Aramis nodded. Then he ripped his hair out of its little ponytail and scratched at the loosened ends as he tried to figure out what to do.

Beside him, Porthos breathed deeply and stared at the wall, face unreadable. Aramis wanted to reach out, bring him back, but it'd only be a selfish action on his part. Likewise, it was pretty shitty of him to be noticing, now of all times, how well that white chef coat looked on Porthos. Having been through service, it was a bit messed up now, but on Porthos it just seemed... professional. With his face set in grim, serious lines, he certainly looked like a seasoned veteran of the food industry. And Aramis might have just fucked up this chance for both of them.

A delayed flush crept across his skin in mortification. He had no excuse.

He had to fix this for Porthos, at least. He had no idea how he was going to do it, but Porthos had earned this. Aramis was just the lucky son of a bitch along for another ride.

He took a deep breath and rolled his shoulders, preparing for war. He turned to open the door.

“Sorry about that,” he called, only to startle backwards when he found Athos sitting cross-legged at the foot of the door. He had a beer half-way to his lips, and two others opened and sitting before him. The first aid kit and ointment waited in his lap.

Aramis stared at Athos, who looked up at him with those discomposing blue eyes for a few beats before he peered around Aramis to check on Porthos.

“You looked like you needed a drink,” he mumbled around the lip of his own bottle. He picked up another bottle, and offered it to Aramis.

Aramis tentatively accepted the drink, fumbling it against his burnt hand. He handed it to Porthos and, against better judgement, settled down to sit on the floor between them, bracing himself between the door frame.

Athos passed him the third beer, and Aramis took a long swallow.

“Where's the rest of the staff?” Porthos inquired, fiddling with his bottle more than drinking it.

“Celebrating at the bar,” Athos explained. “I doubt anything short of a kitchen fire will get their attention.”

“So…” Aramis searched for a way to start. There was no way the next few minutes weren’t going to be awkward, but he needed to make sure that when he tried to pull out of the nosedive, it didn't sink Porthos further.

“How long?” Athos interrupted. He didn't look pissed off, if Aramis were being honest with himself. He just looked defeated and shut down.

“Year and a half,” Porthos said from behind Aramis.

Athos’ eyebrows shot up, and he somehow managed to look even more befuddled and lost.

“Did you really think we were just roommates?” Aramis couldn’t help but ask. Porthos swatted at him.

“I suppose I didn’t let myself think anything. I didn't want to let anything get in the way,” Athos spoke slowly. They were simple words, but he measured them out carefully. He took a sip of his beer and huffed, a low, unhappy noise that tugged at Aramis.

“Nothing has to change,” Porthos rumbled out from where he sat, staring at Athos from the other side of the door. He twisted on the stoop and leaned so far forward that he was almost spilled over Aramis' lap, but Athos avoided meeting their eyes. Lord, but they looked like a couple of kids being told they couldn't play together anymore.

Aramis held his tongue and, carefully, he took stock of the men on either side of the door.

An intriguing thought strayed across his conscious.

Athos knew about them, but he hadn't been surprised—so maybe Athos had thought about them. In any other situation Aramis would question what that meant, but this was Athos. Aramis already felt like he knew the man inside and out. He was comfortable around him, in a way he never had before Porthos and certainly hadn't expected from anyone else. They had banged out service like a dream tonight, and they had in the past few weeks spent more nights sleeping at his place than they had at their own.

Aramis was baffled to realize that he'd never before spent so much time at a stranger's house without having sex with them. Hell, he hadn't been able to bring himself to have sex with Porthos under Athos' roof, and he was dating Porthos.

Aramis had decided to hold back the truth from Athos, and Porthos had followed his lead. Athos had never put his foot down between them, even in his own house, even though he'd admitted...What exactly? He'd thought about them? Aramis would be lying to say the idea wasn't appealing. Just watching him and Porthos lately was like watching a firework display, the way they ribbed on each other and the way Porthos watched Athos when they worked—

That's when he must've burned his hand. He remembered turning to plate the trout and fumbling a cast iron pan when he caught the heat he was feeling mirrored on Porthos' face, directed at Athos while he called out orders like he was leading them into battle.

So Porthos was on board; Athos could be on board but thought he shouldn't be. That just left Aramis.

Well, they could make that work, right?

He nudged at Porthos with his knee, just a gentle tap to his chest. When he had his attention, Aramis raised an eyebrow and let his lips twist into their most tantalizing, questioning curl. He nodded his head at Athos.

Porthos’ eyebrows shot up his forehead, then came down in a disbelieving glare.

Aramis shrugged, but tried to make his eyes soft. Non-confrontational, just a suggestion, ball's in your court. He took another sip of beer, and waited for Porthos to decide their fate.

Porthos rolled his eyes and rubbed at his mouth. Considering. Aramis tried not to tap his toes against the door frame impatiently. The concentration on Porthos' face wasn't entirely pleasant to witness. Aramis held his breath to keep his heart from sinking, and he felt more than saw Porthos' gaze flicking between him and Athos.

Then Porthos’ face became thoughtful. He cocked his head to the side and let his eyes grow curious. Aramis wanted to huddle closer and reassure him, explain that there was no reason to look at things with such longing when Aramis was right here to help him seize it—

His heart thudded loudly in his chest when Porthos nodded.

Aramis turned back to Athos, who was watching them confused but curious.

"Did an entire conversation just happen right there?"

“Do you want to come home with us?” Aramis asked bluntly. He crossed his fingers that the direct route would work best because after the past few weeks he did not have the patience for anything suave.

Athos turned bright red and started hacking up his lungs, struggling to swallow down his beer. Aramis waited.

“That’s not a good idea,” Athos bleated, still flushed. Aramis leaned forward and a shiver ran through him when he could barely make out the blue ring of iris around his blown-wide pupils. Athos' chest was breathing in deep gulps, but there was still a magnetism and a steeliness to him that, now that Aramis could freely admit it, drove him wild.

“I think it is,” Aramis said, his voice coming out rougher than he intended. “So does Porthos. Right?” Porthos hummed in agreement and raised his bottle invitingly. His hand other hand came to rest on the lower half of Aramis' back. Athos stared at them both as if they had lost their minds.

“We have to work in this kitchen together. It’s a complication.”

“If you think I’m cooking for a customer’s appreciation or the glory of the food, I’m sorry to say you’ll be disappointed. I’m cooking because I love it. I love creating things, especially if it makes _him_ ," Aramis jerked a thumb towards Porthos. "Smile. Or makes you wrinkle your nose while you try and figure out what I did. Lord knows you'll both devour anything I cook after a long day—what's one more thing on the table?”

“Aramis,” Athos warned off, but Aramis was on a roll now. The more he thought about it, the more he became convinced it was a good idea. Athos fit with them.

He wanted to be convinced; Aramis liked that. Porthos, after initially shooting him down, let Aramis flirt and cook his way into his life, and enjoyed every minute of being wooed. He liked watching Aramis show off and strut. Athos didn’t want that, but he wanted Aramis to show him they were serious, that they were willing to put their hearts down on this if he was.

“Don’t stand there and tell me you haven’t felt this,” Aramis waved a hand to gesture between them and the ice pack fumbled to the floor. He tried to swipe it up quickly before the mood broke. “Between us. I know I have.”

Athos watched him but didn't say anything. Aramis pressed on:

“So, I’m gonna ask again. Want to come home with us?”

“It’s my home.”

“Yeah, but we look better in your kitchen than you do.”

That earned him a cuff to his ear from behind and a quirked smile from Athos.

“I can’t argue with that.”

“Then don’t.” Porthos rose to his feet and held out his hand. “Let’s go.”

Aramis took the hand up easily, relying on Porthos’ strength to pull him to his feet while he clutched his ice pack close. A still, uncertain moment passed where Porthos stood with his hand held out to Athos, who was still curled around the first aid box, but Athos leaned forward, grasped Porthos’ hand, and let himself be hauled up.

“We need to clean,” he muttered, his earlier flush still hanging to the tips of his ears. Aramis grinned at his awkwardness. Far be it from him to derail a potential threesome in lieu of work.

“We’ll do that,” he said. “You go kick the staff out. Then we’ll get out of here.”

"Hand first," Athos gave him an only-slightly mocking look as he brandished the first aid kit at him. Aramis figured he had that coming.

“You good?” Porthos asked him later, after Athos had helped dress his hand and left to check on the wait staff. Aramis grinned, pushed himself onto the balls of his feet, and dropped a kiss onto Porthos’ mouth.

“All good,” he confirmed. “You.”

“Surprisingly, yeah.”

Aramis nodded, feeling flushed enough with success that he let his hand sneak down. He copped a handful of Porthos’ ass before darting away.

“Hey now!”

“Race you!” he called out, already on the other side of the kitchen. Athos walked back in on them playing grab-ass while rushing to wipe the kitchen down, and actually snorted when Aramis tried to pull him into the game. He looked good smiling, the shine breaking through his usual mountain man gruff. Aramis kept up his handsy antics as they locked up the restaurant and stumbled down the road back to Athos’ apartment, just to keep the smile there.

That night, Aramis got to sleep in a bed with Porthos for the first time in weeks. Having the added warmth of Athos was a bonus.

The next morning, Athos stayed curled up next to Porthos while Aramis made coffee in a far too fancy French press he dug up from one of Athos’ endless cabinets. He was proud of himself for getting all three cups down the hall with a bandaged hand.

He figured it would be an easy few hours before they headed back to the restaurant, but when he passed a mug over to Athos, he didn't meet Aramis' eyes. He tapped his fingers against his mug like he had something on his mind. Aramis let him be, turning to press a kiss into Porthos' still-sleepy face. He toyed with the fingertips of Porthos’ free hand while he waited for Athos to work up to words.

Their peaceful morning dragged on for another thirty minutes. Aramis was wide awake and growing more bored by the minute. How the hell could Athos and Porthos just brood here in silence for so long? He was starting to reconsider this patience-thing when he finally got his answer.

“I was in a relationship once,” Athos said, staring into his nearly empty mug with a face far too gloomy amidst all that beddraggled hair. “She was in the kitchen with me. It didn’t end well.”

“What happened?” Aramis asked supportively. He didn’t see a point in dodging questions like that. If Athos didn’t want to answer, he wouldn’t, but this was going to be hard enough if they didn't talk to each other.

“I lost one of the restaurant’s Michelin Stars. She jumped ship. I don’t blame her. She always made it clear her career came first. I just sometimes wished she hadn’t.”

“Well, I’m not going to pretend to be heartbroken,” Aramis told him, taking a pointed sip of his coffee as he aimed his most enticing come-hither stare at him. If Athos had stayed with her, he wouldn’t be here with them. Not a hard decision, in Aramis’ mind.

“Aramis doesn’t do modest,” Porthos explained with an affectionate roll of his eyes. “But he’s right. We’re not planning on going anywhere.”

Porthos took him up on his beckoning offer and kissed him, and then dragged Athos down to kiss him too. Aramis carefully settled all cups of coffee on the bedside table, and then slid the table away from the bed for good measure.

They’d figure this out. They had to if it meant keeping the soaring feeling inside him.

*

Lunch service crashed into dinner, the hours blending into themselves without Athos realizing. He held his breath and held on through the flood. The end of service always caught him by surprise, but these days it disturbed him that he always felt out-of-breath and on the brink of collapse by the time the last ticket left his hand.

Athos took a deep breath, letting his body tally up the pain of the stress and cash it to his conscious. Even his teeth hurt.

Aramis leaned his hip against the counter, smiling in pleasant exhaustion, and threw his arm around Athos’ shoulder. He'd done well today, which was saying something since Aramis always knocked it out of the park, but Athos had never seen so many of their fish specials fly out of the kitchen. Aramis had an almost zen-like quality when he got in the zone, and tonight had been stunning.

He pressed a kiss into the bristles on Athos’ cheek.

“Mo limn twa,” he said, as he often did when their workload ended in a harsh battle. Athos refrained from asking what it meant; there were still some things that he didn’t want to spoil. He watched Aramis say it to Porthos too, whose shoulders were slumped forward and his face colored gray with exhaustion. They still had to clean, and Porthos in particular would be working straight into Monday. Athos had to wonder if this was worth it.

A now predictable feeling took hold of Athos, two adverse emotions roiling against each other: a rise of pride and adoration that Aramis and Porthos rose to the demands of the kitchen every night, and the sinking guilt of knowing he pushed them hard and made strong demands on their skills. On their time and energy, on their relationship. He couldn’t help but ponder how much longer either of them could go before they snapped.

He was also afraid to ask if they were too overwhelmed to stay. They could say yes, and then what would Athos be left with? Without them, Athos was terrified that he would find himself back where he started, blacked out in the bottom of the gutter. If they decided to move on like Anne. He couldn’t let himself think about it, mainly because he didn’t think he could survive it.

Shaking out his thoughts, Athos stuck his head out into the front of the house. The dinning room was cleared, with the staff giving each of the tables a last wipe down and busing the last of the dirty dishes. Serge followed after them, lifting up the chairs onto the tables to make it easier for the vacuum Florian wheeled. Constance, running through the numbers up front at the host’s station, waved at him.

Athos started to go to her, but force of habit made him look at the wait roster on his right. He stared. Over the last two weeks, the prized hundred dollar bill stayed magnetized to the top of the board, tauntingly out of reach. Tonight, they had a complete row of ‘x’s across the bottom of the chart.

He thought back to Aramis' specials. And the tickets he called out earlier in the evening. He had indeed called out each item off the menu, including the poultry dishes that were normally a harder sell to their seafood-loving clientèle.

D’Artagnan had the full row.

Athos hummed to himself as his mind raced. He grabbed the hundred and ventured out into the dinning room, where he found d’Artagnan scrubbing tables near the large front window.

He studied him for a moment. As far as services went it hadn't been their worse, but he knew Constance was going to have his ear over the wait times again. In hindsight, he would've expected the new guy to hassle the kitchen more. Even Constance couldn't help herself some days, anxiously hovering at the door where she didn't know Athos could see her.

Athos tried to recall the past few hours. He could remember sliding plates over the hothead, and a swish of black hair whenever d'Artagnan swooped away with an order before he finished calling it. He'd sworn to Aramis at the start that he'd work better on his communication in the kitchen, too used to a kitchen that functioned more like a hive-mind. But during service he hadn't thought about that, or about teaching the new guy all the shorthands. He was just grateful that he could quit talking and get back to cooking.

He'd have to talk to Constance about making sure the kid tied back his hair though.

Athos tapped d'Artagnan on the shoulder, and offered out the hundred between two fingers.

“Good job."

D’Artagnan grinned, and the bill quickly disappeared onto his person.

“Thanks for the food."

“Come by on Tuesday and you can sit in on the family meal with us,” Athos offered before he could second guess himself. “We usually don’t do one on Sunday, but since you helped out it’s the least we could do."

D'Artagnan looked baffled. Athos figured he needed to explain himself further, but Constance called his name, impatiently waiving her planner at him, and he opted to deal with her first.

After all, d'Artagnan was her catch; may as well let her tell the kid he was hired.

*

D’Artagnan made a mental note to ask Constance what the hell the family meal was, and if he needed to do anything. Was it like a potluck? His father used to orchestrate neighborhood wide cook-outs after hurricanes, when the electricity was out for days and the food in the fridge needed cooking before it became inedible. Those had helped everyone pull through together after taking stock of their yearly damages. Maybe this was a less rough-and-tumble version of that, because after tonight's service he certainly felt like he'd walked through a hurricane.

It was exhilarating. And exhausting.

D'Artagnan rubbed his palms against his eyes and sighed, trying to loosen the tightness his shoulders twisted themselves into during his shift. It'd been years since he worked the front of the house, and nearing another year since he'd worked in a restaurant at all. He'd smiled and pandered to the customers, and stumbled through the menu a mortifying number of times at the start, and persevered through complaining tables and long wait times, and now he had a hundred bucks to show for it.

Admittedly, he had the food to thank for that. He hadn't missed waiting tables, but it was something special to see what came out of this kitchen. Halfway through service, he'd convinced a good many of his tables into picking a dessert just by talking about what he'd eaten earlier that morning, and most of those tables had still been waiting on appetizers.

He could see where Constance's nervous energy came from these days. He'd never felt so motivated to do a good job and so held back from being able to do better. He'd said more apologies today than he'd heard at his dad's funeral. If The Garrison could just figure out how to get the food out quicker they’d be golden, but between the packed reservations list and the long seating time for walk-ins, the kitchen had a knot looped around the restaurant’s throat.

D'Artagnan shook his head; he should be working, not wasting time trying to figure out their business model. He looked for Constance, intending to ask her what else needed doing, and caught her pointing at him while talking to Athos.

“Oh, shoot,” came a soft voice from behind, and D’Artagnan was saved from coming up with an excuse to look busy. He turned in time to see Emilie, a tall redhead with a shy smile and dreamy eyes, fumble with a armful of plates that looked bigger than she was.

“Here, let me help,” he offered, darting forward as they threatened to topple. She gratefully unloaded them into his arms, and waved him towards the kitchen.

“Thanks. Jacques is at the dishwashing station in the back.”

“On it.”

D’Artagnan shuffled his way towards the back, making sure to announce where he was as other staff members dashed around him like a well-oiled machine, the same way they'd been through service. It was a bit of a culture shock, in a way that traveling to Louisiana hadn't been; he'd never realized before how wrong-footed being the new guy could be. He'd been fighting to match pace with the staff all night, learning cook times and the work flow of the front, and trying not to focus so hard that he crashed into someone. He did not want to be that guy who broke something on the first day. A collision equaled broken plates and glasses, and he didn't have enough to lose a dent out of his money.

Was he expected to bring something to family meal? He could manage, he supposed. Everyone he'd spoken to had been nice, almost desperately gratefully to have the extra help. He didn’t want to break the new hundred dollars in his pocket yet, but he could whip something together to thank them.

Jacques nodded at him when d’Artagnan dropped off the dishes, bopping and weaving along to the whatever song his headphones were playing as he cleaned. D’Artagnan was so preoccupied making sure the teen wouldn't accidentally elbow his plates off the rack that when he turned back toward the kitchen he jumped to find his way blocked by a towering brick wall disguised in a chef’s coat.

“Here,” Porthos said, holding out a tasting spoon covered in a thick, silky caramel sauce. d’Artagnan stared, and when he opened his mouth to ask why Porthos shoved the spoon into his mouth.

The caramel was startlingly warm, but not enough to burn. It slipped smoothly against his tongue, not too sticky or tacky. There was a tint of salt in it as well, just enough to jumpstart his taste-buds.

D'Artagnan had been holding out hope for a hug from Constance after the day he'd had, but as he swallowed around his spoon he felt the stress melting off him all the same.

“Hello,” d'Artagnan mumbled around the spoon. He'd be damned if he was going to give it back sooner than he had to, but he should probably show some manners. “Pleased to meet you again. This is good—what’s it for?”

“Croquembouche."

“What the hell is that? And do I have to give the spoon back?”

Porthos gave him a conspiratorial grin. “Good?"

D’Artagnan just moaned. He didn't mean too. The day had just been a roller coaster, and he'd spent most of it talking up food. He couldn't think up any new words to describe how fantastic this was.

“Come on, then,” Porthos ordered, moving back to the kitchen.

At the dessert station, a dozen tiny puff pastries sat in a delicate pile alongside a tipped pastry bag filled with soft white cream. Porthos picked up a puff, gently poked a hole in the flat side, and piped in a healthy dose of filling.

He held it out to d’Artagnan.

“Eat,” he demanded, as if d’Artagnan would have said 'no'. He took a small bite, at this point no longer surprised that he like the delicious mix of fluffy pastry and rich cream, with just enough crunch to add texture. He was almost fed up with how good everything in this restaurant tasted.

“Awesome, glad that worked out,” Porthos muttered. He filled another puff, and dipped it into a small pot on the stove. Smooth caramel shone upon the puff, and d’Artagnan didn’t bother holding back. He swallowed it down, and while his mouth was too full to compliment, he gave a thumbs up.

Porthos grinned, his chest puffing up as he watched d'Artagnan lick his fingers. He handed him a dish towel to wipe his hands with, then picked up the next pastry to start filling. He had the same bull-like expression of focus that he'd had this morning, but he didn't tell d'Artagnan to shoo. In fact, he was moving slower compared to this morning, angling so d'Artagnan could see him as he worked.

"The trick of it," Porthos said, "Is that each part has got to be text book. Recipes all look simple enough, but they're hard to _learn_ right when you try 'em on your own. How's the filling taste?"

He nodded at a second piping bag, and d'Artagnan took the hint. He squeezed some of the cream onto his finger, and as he sucked it off he tried to really concentrate on what he was tasking.

Vanilla. Cream, or milk? Butter. Maybe cornstarch.

He frowned. He popped his finger out of his mouth and absently wiped it on his pants, trying to think of something nice to say.

"It's fresh?"

Porthos barked a laugh at him, loud and startling enough that d'Artagnan saw Aramis' head whip around to stare, but it wasn't unkind.

"'s alright. It's bland as hell, innit?" Porthos grinned, as if he was letting him in on a joke. "Means I made it right. Not everything's gotta be gourmet on it's own, ya know? It's all gonna taste good when it's together. The pastry too--it's a bitch to make. A lot of steps and time to get 'em right, even if the end result don't look like the kind've thing to brag about."

But it wasn't less impressive for looking simple. D'Artagnan watched, fascinated, as Porthos deftly finished filling a line of pastries. Once he had his little army, he dipped them one by one into the caramel, which he used as a glue to bind his soldiers as he built them up into a little cone tower.

D'Artagnan couldn't stop smiling as the last little pastry went on top. Just when he thought he was annoyed by their talent, too. But this was... this looked _fun._ Porthos had clearly put a lot of work into it, but it looked so easy. He watched as Porthos delicately maneuvered some sort of spirally, golden webbing around the tower, and when Porthos stepped back, he'd made a tiny work of art.

"It's amazing," he said sincerely. Porthos sent him an appreciative look. The chef studied his tower, looking only a little wobbly but full of pride. He nodded in agreement, and broke off a piece of golden spiral, which he held out to d'Artagnan.

The web broke with a sharp _crack_ under his teeth, and he blinked as he realized it was more caramel. Porthos sent him a wink and pushed his discarded tasting spoon back to him.

"Careful there," he gestured at the heated pot of caramel, and d'Artagnan didn't need telling twice. "It's a bit hotter than the stuff I already fed ya, but you can help yourself. Tell me if you think it needs more salt."

“Not that I’m complaining, but is there any reason you’re using me as a guinea pig?” D'Artagnan licked at a thick spoonful of caramel as he watched Porthos pull another small line of pastries out of the refrigerator.

“I can’t intimidate the rest of the staff into being my taste-testers anymore,” Porthos said solemnly. D'Artagnan didn't pity them in the slightest, then. More for him.

“Is this homemade caramel?” he asked, leaning over to all but stick his nose over the saucepan. It really did smell amazing.

“Yeah. Finicky as all hell. It took making it eight times before I got it right.”

“Why wasn’t this on the menu sooner!” d’Artagnan couldn't help complaining; he could have sold so many of these a few hours ago. The more he thought about what Porthos said, the more it sounded like a perfect pairing for the entrees: simple, humble flavors but surprisingly decadent and strikingly packaged. It would hold up well against the entrees, not to mention the tables would go wild when it hit the dining room.

Porthos rewarded his outrage by grabbing his spoon from him, dipping it back in the caramel, and handing it back to him. As d’Artagnan licked it clean, Aramis snorted. He appeared at d'Artagnan's side, stripped out of his chef’s coat and his shirt damp from scrubbing down his station.

“Oh Porthos, don’t feed him off your tasting spoons,” Aramis mourned. “You don’t know where he’s been.”

“Hey now,” d’Artagnan protested jokingly. “I have a very clean mouth.”

Aramis smiled, slow and hot and his eyes lit up like a fire under a stove top. “How would I know? Was that an invitation to find out?"

d’Artagnan refused to back down from Aramis' ridiculous, sultry eyes, even as he cursed that he'd inherited his father's ability to blush at the drop of a hat. He heard Porthos huff a laugh beside him, but didn't dare look.

“What kind of experience you got?”

"Only enough to rock your world." Aramis volleyed back, making d'Artagnan's face burn ten times hotter.

D’Artagnan didn’t see a way out of the quickly deepening hole he was digging himself, but he'd be damned if he'd admit defeat now.

“Really? I’'ll bet you couldn’t even rock my socks.”

Aramis grinned and leaned forward, one hand resting on the counter top, and d'Artagnan was hyper-aware of how the wet spots of his shirt clung against his chest. It was as if the whole world was concentrated down to just the two of them, and d’Artagnan felt pinned like a dear in a floodlight. He tried to swallow, and found his couldn’t even get his body to cooperate with him on that.

“Stop flirting with the poor boy, Aramis,” Porthos groused, breaking the moment with a gentle shove to d’Artagnan’s shoulder. He grabbed d’Artagnan’s wrist, and dropped another caramel-coated pastry into his palm.

Aramis didn’t stop grinning, but the sudden intensity that had filled the room was gone, shrugged off as if it were nothing. With a causal wink tossed d’Artagnan’s way, he held out his hand to Porthos, who rewarded him with his own sugary treat. He happily munched as he went back to scrubbing his station, as if hadn’t just raised d’Artagnan’s temperature by ten degrees and jump started his heartbeat. Porthos started assembling a second tower, and when Aramis turned on the radio, he hummed along with the calming sound of Muddy Waters.

D’Artagnan’s throat bobbed as he forced himself to swallow around his paper-dry mouth. What on earth just happened?

He popped the dessert behind his teeth and chewed automatically, if only to keep his tongue from flirting with men too dangerous for his blood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are always welcome :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Constance frets and makes a new friend.  
> Athos loves to cook for people; talk to them, not so much

Constance flopped down against her pillow, hair splaying everywhere, as she gave a long, contented sigh.

"God, that was amazing."

D'Artagnan grinned proudly. "Yeah?"

"Definitely."

"Glad to hear it," he said, only a little smug. Then before she could react, he snatched her bowl out of her hands and ate her last meatball. He had to lean back to dodge her pillow as it came careening towards his face, heedless of the sauce she'd get everywhere if she connected, and instead ended up sliding off the couch. The floor's only protection came from his hand covering the bowl and keeping most of its contents contained.

On the screen in front of them, the television host cackled wildly as two contestant chefs were handcuffed together.

"What did I do to deserve this?" he whined, licking sauce off his hand before wiping the remaining tomato sauce off on his shirt. "I made your favorite meal. I even did the veal and the pork!"

"It was lovingly done," Constance agreed. She gave him a pleased look and let go of the pillow, reaching out to comb through his hair. He leaned into her touch and regretted it instantly when she twisted her fingers through the strands and _tugged._

"And then you stole it," she said sadly. "Now you have to die."

"But I was gonna turn the meatballs into sliders later—,"

"You may live," was her instant reprieve. Her lips quirked in a small smile as she looked at d'Artagnan, but it started to fade. She slid her fingers against his hairline again, nonviolently this time, and d'Artagnan stayed quiet while she collected her thoughts. The chefs on the TV were struggling, the handcuffed pair tripping around each other while another had forgotten at least two key ingredients to bake a pie. D'Artagnan struggled to come up with a way for the fourth chef to save his pie crust with ground beef—could he mold it against the ramekin and make it stick somehow? No, make little pie cups with the ground beef and then put the filling in. Wait, that would just be stuffed meatballs—when Constance came back online:

"So. How did you like being back in the real world again?" she asked softly.

D'Artagnan had been expecting it, but his throat still closed up tight as he swallowed. She had requested spaghetti and meatballs for dinner, claiming that her years as the wife of a chef had allowed her own culinary skills to rust and he needed to pull his own weight. He privately suspected the true reason for it had been his own desire for his favorite comfort food. Still, he was proud that she had started making jokes about her marriage, even if she only meant to distract him.

D'Artagnan glanced towards the end of the couch where his duffle bag sat alongside the sheets for his makeshift bed and figured he could do with more distracting.

He sniffed, trying to get the pounding in his chest under control.

"It was good. And it was nice—I really like your restaurant, Constance." He paused, then turned to face her. "You've done a really good job not killing your boss over his wait times."

"I know!" Constance threw herself back into the couch pillows with a groan, flinging her arm across her eyes, and he patted her thigh in a conciliatory gesture, which caused her to respond with a humming noise as she dug her fingers into his hair again. When she stretched against the couch, he heard her back pop and winced in sympathy. He'd let her unwind, he decided, willing himself to zone out in front of the TV like a normal, well-adjusted person. He needed a reprieve too.

A while later D’Artagnan was still sitting on the floor, legs stretched out before him and his back to the couch while Constance toyed with his hair. He idly played on his phone, flipping between a few recipes pulled up from earlier and browsing a dictionary of French cuisine and cooking terms when she cleared her throat.

His eyes came up as she hit the mute button on the television, momentarily silencing Alton Brown’s maniacal laugh as he wielded a ball of tin off for auctioning as if it were the Holy Grail.

“Do you wanna come into work with me again on Tuesday?” Constance asked. D’Artagnan didn’t hesitate.

“Hell yes.”

She laughed, high and quick cut off in a matter of seconds. D’Artagnan tilted his head back and watched in fascination as she opened her mouth, closed it, swished her lips back and forth across her face. She opened her mouth again only to say nothing.

“Something on your mind?” he asked, a bit rhetorically. She pouted and tugged gently at a lock of his hair. He was beginning to worry about her new-found habit.

“Could you,” she bit at her lower lip as she tried to get the words around the storm cloud of thoughts d’Artagnan saw brewing in the wrinkles between her eyes. “Could you not mention that we live together?”

“Ashamed of me?” d’Artagnan asked with a cheeky smile that hid the flash of hurt. Was that what this was about?

“No!” Constance defended instantly. She released his head and slid off the couch to sit eye level with him, pressing her shoulder against his. “It’s just, I don’t want to have to answer questions about why. Or have any of them think you got this job just because you’re my friend."

“I did just get this job because you’re my friend.”

“ _And_ ,” Constance emphasized, gesturing at their discarded bowls of pasta. “Because you know what you’re doing. I just…I don’t talk about my life at work.” She started picking at her fingernails, a habit d’Artagnan hadn’t seen her succumb to since before her divorce, and he reached out with his hand to cover hers.

Her fingers twisted around so they could entwine with his, and they sat in silence with each other. There was too much emotion in the room to get a word in edgewise.

D’Artagnan had known Constance for almost a decade. They'd grown up together, running bare foot and careless in the thick heat of the Everglades, and had even dated through their junior and senior years of high school. D'Artagnan wanted to curl into a ball and hide when he thought about the whopper of hormones and fervent emotions they'd been back then. His father had been a saint, quietly shifting aside his own loss to sit up with his lovelorn son long into the night to help reason with him, telling him that it was okay if he thought he was in love. But really son, d’Artagnan remembered him saying, if you want it to last you gotta compromise.

D’Artagnan hadn’t believed him. Disney taught him that love could conquer anything, and it was easier to believe in that then face the truth: Constance knew she was never going to stay in their small town, and d’Artagnan had no reason to leave. Everything he'd ever known was within his tiny community, and as much as he tried he couldn’t relate to her desire to get away. Why would he want to? He couldn’t leave his father, not after his mother had run off without a word. He needed to stay, needed to help keep the farm going.

So Constance went off to college, and he settled down into a life he figured he’d live until he died.

They stayed in touch at first. Constance would talk about her business classes; d'Artagnan, about the grease fire at work that had melted part of his shoe. Constance moved forward, succeeded. She described long study nights and how she had organized an impromptu potluck for her dorm. In return, d’Artagnan stagnated, waded. He confided in her how the mediocre promotion from waiter to kitchen staff had made his job more enjoyable, and how he thought he could actually do something like that with his life someday.

Sometimes he thought about a different future, but than the hours went longer and his dad struggled to stay awake to make sure he got home safe later and later. Frankly, his old man was looking grayer these days, and his joints caused him more and more trouble each week.They both woke early to tend their modest farm, and d'Artagnan left around noon to head to work, but the bills were adding up.

It was nice having someone to share things with. Even long distance, though daily life got in the way and the phone calls and Skype sessions grew further apart, d'Artagnan always felt comforted when he managed to talk to Constance. She had a way of taking insurmountable valleys and turning them into an obstacle that could instead be crossed by pole vaulting. The least he could do to repay her was be supportive when she mentioned she was seeing someone.

Not that he did a good job of that.

D'Artagnan hardly noticed the first time she mentioned Jacques. Or the third, fourth, or tenth time. He could admit now he had been petulant. It must have been like pulling teeth for her to get him to have a normal conversation on a regular basis. That was probably why, years later, when she started casually mentioning plans for the future, he didn't question it. Just let the implications skitter around the growing elephant he wanted to pretend wasn't in the room.

One day she called him and told him she was getting married. To Jacques, who was a chef. Jacques, who spun dreams about opening up his own restaurant in Los Angeles. With Constance’s help of course. She was Jacques’ rock, after all.

D’Artagnan didn’t go to the wedding; Constance didn’t talk to him for the next two years.

He had almost given up on ever speaking to her again. His father had rubbed soothing circles into his back and reminded him that a lack of passion had never been their family's headache.

Jacques might have been a decent cook, d’Artagnan supposed, but he was also a glaring idiot who had driven one of his closest friends to the brink full speed with no care to any real plan. Dragging Constance out west to follow some celebrity chef pipe dream had been bad enough, but the tangled mess he'd made of her life hadn't left much of the happy, confident woman who'd left him in Florida. D’Artagnan’s heart twisted every time they video chatted, each time her face a little more weathered down and broken. She ran his restaurant to success but it had cost her, and all d’Artagnan could do from a country away was lend an ear and offer support as she worked out what to do.

Probably the only good thing to come from their separation was that d'Artagnan was far from the blast radius when the details of the divorce came down, because nothing would have saved Jacques had d'Artagnan lived closer. To this day, d’Artagnan didn’t think Jacques should have been allowed to keep the restaurant, but Constance told him she was happier letting the whole matter drop off her shoulders. She was going to move back south, she told him. Maybe to New Orleans. She could take advantage of being in a bigger city to find another job. It wasn't Florida, but maybe sometime he and his dad could take some time away from the farm to come visit her?

D'Artagnan snapped out of his reverie to watch a contestant drop a live crab into pot of boiling water.

“I don’t want any of them thinking any less of me,” Constance muttered against his shoulder. She'd slumped towards him, and the line of her body was a warm and grounding weight as he tried to put his life back together and remember what they'd been talking about.

D’Artagnan was going to work with her, and the excitement of going back for a second round was almost enough to cut through the melancholy he hadn’t yet been able to shake. He seriously doubted that she'd come across anyone thinking less of her within her staff, who moved like a symphony to her conductor’s baton, but he could think of a reason to deny her.

“Of course,” he acquiesced. “Anything.”

She smiled and dropped a kiss onto his cheek. “Thank you.”

*

Athos understood that the Sunday/Monday break was sacred. Monday was the The Garrison's one day off during the week—theoretically.

Aramis and Porthos admitted at the start that they hadn't planned days off into their schedule on the food truck. There were always crowds to catch: drunk crowds on Friday, shopping crowds on Saturday, church and game crowds on Sunday, and work crowds on Monday. He probably could've pieced together that with the truck being so popular it would be too busy for one person to manage, but it hadn't occurred to him that they were on the truck together literally every day.

As it was, Athos cringed at the thought of working employees on a seven-days-a-week scheduling. He'd done that dance when he'd started at Le Fronge fresh out of culinary school, and he had the coping skills of someone who'd drunk straight through their twenties to prove it. Next to his own craggy, broken-in countenance, Porthos and Aramis may as well have been daisies in the field for how fresh-faced they appeared.

So The Garrison worked out a nice pattern.

Sunday crowds usually cleared out the counters at Alice’s bakery, which Athos had learned was catty-cornered just down the road from The Garrison. Porthos would head over late Sunday night—after their restaurant's deep clean—to help Alice get a head start on the baking for her busy Monday morning. The Garrison won out by not straining their budget on the baking supplies for Porthos' projects, the goods of which couldn't be sold fast enough to warrant the amount of test batches he'd whip up in a morning. In return, Alice got an extra, enthusiastic pair of hands that could shift easily from delicate piping to hauling heavy flour bags, plus the extra revenue when Porthos' baked goods started flying off her shelves. More important than getting Porthos more experience was the arrangement that The Garrison could also borrow a member of Alice's staff every Sunday, to help with prep in the mornings while Aramis attended mass.

Porthos brokered the last part of the deal. After the three of them had settled on the scheduling (six workdays a week would have to fly for now, Athos reluctantly admitted), Porthos had cornered Athos on the matter.

"What would it take to get another chef in here on Sundays?" Porthos asked, after Aramis had swanned out of the kitchen to go flirt with their new staff manager. Porthos was pretty blunt these days, but Athos hadn't expected much in the way of small talk or big talk when the man was up to his elbows in flour. Without Aramis to fill the gap between them, the kitchen lapsed into quiet, companionable jibing.

Usually, the difference between his new coworkers' attitudes and the weedy in-fighting of Athos' former staff was so striking that Athos could've happily cried himself to sleep. But talk of another round of hiring, even the implication of spending money this soon to opening, was enough to put Athos' hackles up.

"I was only planning on the three of us to start with," he bit out, hands freezing around the crab claws he was breaking open. "Did you have something else in mind?"

"Aramis likes to go to church."

"Aramis might have to get used to going in on Mondays for a while," Athos said it as gently as he could, hating that he sounded defensive but trying soften the blow all the same.

"What if I knew a way to get someone else in to cover prep?" Porthos perservered, moving in closer and lowering his voice. His hands were raised and powdery, either in supplication or so he wouldn't accidentally dust against Athos' workstation. He looked so sincere. "Just the prep, nothin' fancy."

"Is there a problem I need to know about?"

"It's important to him," Porthos stalled for a moment, chewing on his lips and clearly debating on how much he wanted to divulge to Athos. "We been running nonstop for months now. But I swear, you give him this an' he'll be your star chef when he comes in after."

 _But Aramis isn't the one who bakes me cookies_ was probably not the best boss response to Porthos' bleeding-heart face, but he was so close Athos could smell the sugar on him and it made him weak.

"...What did you have in mind?"

Porthos told him. He was appalled to learn that Porthos's plan to lighten the load for Aramis involved letting Porthos work himself to the bone in his stead, but even Athos had noticed between the renovations and testing the menu that Aramis had become more withdrawn. Not that Athos had been helping things lately. His drinking wasn't near as bad as it'd been just a few months ago, but Porthos and Aramis easily spent as much time babysitting him at home as they did at The Garrison. They probably hadn't spent more than an hour at their own apartment in the past two weeks.

Athos grudgingly agreed to the plan, and received from Porthos a thankful clap on his elbow and a dimply, crinkly smile that should have sent him tattling to Aramis on suspicions alone. He tried to bury it instead.

By the following month he had them both in his bed despite himself.

As per their new routine, Porthos would help Alice open and linger a few hours to check on customer responses to his new offerings, before heading home where he would understandably crash into bed and sleep for the next fourteen hours straight.

Athos was never one to be able to relax on a rest day. As much as he wished he could wallow in the warmth of Porthos' company in his bed, he slept too lightly to not be waken wide awake when Porthos crept in around the same time the sun made it into his window. Between the heat and the light, Athos would just look around his bedroom and silently…panic.

He had so much to do, why was he just lying there?

He should be taking the opportunity to check in with their vendors and look for new, fresh finds. He could use the time to make notes, and consider adding new menu items based off whatever fish, meats, and vegetables came in down at the harbor. Staying ahead of the curb crucial to the culinary industry.

Other people could have their days off; Athos was ruined for them anyways.

He usually embarked on his travels solo. Then one morning, after his first two cups of coffee and feeling fortified enough to handle the world, Athos pulled his shoes on only to straighten up and find Aramis standing in front of him, smiling brightly and looking just as ready for the day.

“…Good morning,” Athos greeted. Aramis’ smile didn’t dim a watt as he leaned in and bestowed a light, innocent kiss on Athos. He tasted like toothpaste and sleep, and Athos found himself leaning into him despite himself.

“Good morning,” Aramis replied. Athos had to shake himself out of the man’s natural pull; it was far too simple to reach out and touch. They hadn’t discussed what to do in the restaurant, but in the haven of his apartment Aramis seemed to take his presence in their relationship easily, indulging in touches and abandoning personal space entirely.

As if reading his mind, Aramis reached out and adjusted Athos' collar, smoothing his fingers down the top buttons at his neck, before pulling back and to run his hand through his hair.

“Ready to go?” Aramis asked. He had a messenger bag strapped across his shoulders and a gleam in his eye. Athos still wasn't sure what Aramis did with himself on the mornings before Athos got up, other than rummage about his house like a stray cat and—if you believed him—did yoga.

“Go?” Athos repeated, because he wasn't running on all cylinders yet and Aramis had reverted his brain to mush.

Aramis hummed a happy affirmative and held open the door. He looked clean and put together in simple jeans and a t-shirt he had no right to look that good in, but his hair still looked sleep-mussed and Athos could see faint pillow crease-marks dancing near his stubble. Athos sometimes had the feeling that his life hadn't gotten the memo on what he was allowed to have anymore, because Aramis linked their arms together as if he didn’t think twice about touching Athos.

“Shopping then? At least, I think you were headed to the markets. If you’re hitting up hookers down on Bourbon St, I guess we can do that too. I’m sure Porthos won’t care as long as we don’t wake him up until dinner.”

Athos let himself be dragged out the door, only barely getting the lock flipped behind him. They got outside and down the street before Athos realized Aramis was leading them the wrong way. Planting his weight on one side, he used their linked arms to drag Aramis in a circle and head in the opposite direction.

He didn't let go of Aramis as they kept walking.

“I can’t imagine where you thought we were headed," he muttered.

“Well, I thought we were going to the suppliers, but are we heading to the fancy side of town?"

Athos drew up a map of the city in his mind, trying to figure out where Aramis had planned on going.

“Were you headed for the docks?” he asked, curious. Aramis shrugged, but let himself be guided by Athos, his arm warm and tucked into the crook of his elbow.

“That was the plan.”

“What were you going to do? Buy it right off the boats?”

Aramis tilted his head and grinned. “I’m pretty good at convincing fisherman to give me things. A little rapport goes a long way in making sure they don’t charge me too hefty a mark up, and I don’t have to deal with a middle men.”

That actually didn’t sound terrible, if only because Athos had to agree that dealing with the middle man agents who wormed their way into the supply line irritated him. Maybe he’d let Aramis drag him down there next Monday so Athos could see him in action.

But for now, he wanted to see Aramis react when Athos showed him where Athos thought they needed to go.

Tréville had been the one to introduce him to the New Orleans Seafood Exchange and its lovely proprietress, Anne de Bourbon. Athos appreciated her quiet, calm demeanor and the iron fist with which she ruled the common market that took place within her property. Spread out over a near whole block, the NOSE was part art open air market, part multi-storied buildings blasted with freezing air conditioning, and all organized chaos. Anne kept vendors ruthlessly in line with their prices and their quality, making sure her supply chains were never flooded with inferior product. She was also more welcoming to start-up customers than some of the other, deeper established exchanges, which allowed Athos to keep his budget reigned in enough to stop Constance’s eyes from going crazy.

He also never had to worry about running across his own Anne. The Louvre sourced their seafood out of Louisiana’s Best across town. Not that he obsessively stalked out information like that to make sure nothing from his past and present ever crossed paths. The Garrison was a new start for Athos, and new starts shouldn't be dragged down by painful memories—they should be dragged around on Monday mornings to haggle with fish mongers.

As they entered the exchange, an aroma of raw seafood crashed down on them, incredibly pungent and hard to walk through for the kind of people who possessed delicate sensibilities. Athos, he was ashamed to admit, had never shaken his meticulous sense of smell. It'd taken him years to get used to the powerful essence of this kind of place, salt and brine heavy on the air.

Beside him, Aramis puffed out a noise of surprise and then inhaled a deep, all-encompassing breath. His expression as he looked around the market made Athos’ morning.

“Never been here?” he asked. Aramis let out a disbelieving laugh.

“I’ve never been within five miles of a place like this,” Aramis replied, looking more than a little star-struck.

Fortunes reversed, it fell to Athos to drag him through the stalls and between the pushing crowds, or else he worried Aramis wouldn’t make it past gawking. One second he was ogling the fresh crates of fish being cracked open, the next moment he had disappeared from Athos' side to accept free samples of smoked salmon.

Athos moved around the side of the booth. He waited patiently and a little incredulously as vendors from nearby tables descended upon Aramis, ushering him towards their displays. Athos had born the brunt of Aramis' gregarious good nature, but having an eye-witness view of it was exhilarating. And more than a little entertaining. Even Mr. Wu, the crotchety, taciturn fishmonger with the thickest Georgian accent Athos had ever heard, smiled as he led Aramis to an iced table stacked with blue crabs.

Athos had been buying from Mr. Wu on and off for years. He'd been stared down by the man's stony, unmoving face every time. He didn't even know Mr. Wu _could_ laugh.

"Fresh blue, best ya'll find round here. Mah boys pulled it off the boat this mornin'."

"Well, it's good to hear that some of the family businesses are still making it work,” Aramis acknowledged without hesitation. "I know it's been rough in the area after the oil spill. Your catch staying steady, or you roughing it along like everyone else?"

"It's not the same for anyone these days,” Mr. Wu smoothed out the fuzz of his goatee, his face lined like a crumpled newspaper. "Some days the traps'll come up empty. _But_ mah boys work hard to stay consistent ’n provide a good product to all our customers, as Mr. de la Fere here can surely attest."

He nodded at Athos with something that could be interpreted as respect, and Athos stared back incredulously. Aramis gave Mr. Wu a considering nod and turned back to Athos with something fond and warm in his face. Athos stared back helplessly, words failing him. What the hell?

"Try a crab cake," Wu offered, breaking the mood. "New recipe. Very tasty, ’n completely Paleo."

Athos tried not to roll his eyes.

"You're kidding," Aramis chirped, as if this was the most fascinating thing about his day. With a sly grin, he accepted one of the crab cakes. It was small in the palm of his hand—smaller even than Athos would ever serve as an appetizer—but Aramis only took a careful bite out of half. He offered the other piece to Athos without a thought.

Athos popped the other half into his mouth, and Aramis and him stared at each other as they chewed.

"Thoughts?" Aramis asked, his tone giving nothing away.

"It tastes like crab," Athos said before realizing that sounded ruder than he meant. "I mean, it should. Crab cakes—,"

"Should taste like crab," Aramis finished with him, smiling.

"...Is that almond flour?" He looked to Mr. Wu for help, but couldn't missed the proud, smug look on Aramis' face as his eyes stayed on Athos.

Mr. Wu launched into a long diatribe hailing the restorative properties of all things almond, and how much his diet had improved his energy. Aramis leaned his hip against the table, oozing charm and attentiveness, and humming encouragingly at all the right spots as he inspected the blue crabs with a wistful quirk to his lips.

Mr. Wu eventually came back to himself and remembered he was supposed to be selling crab. He asked if they'd be buying anything today. Aramis turned towards Athos, eyes sparked with interest.

What the hell, he could always use more crab in his life. Maybe he'd do a crab bisque, something rich with vegetables and wine and heavy cream. He wouldn't even need to prep the fish stock, Athos wondered, because Aramis used _everything_ in the kitchen and didn't mind spreading the love when he had more to share.

Mr. Wu, however, was resilient to anything below a price that made Athos cringe inside. He reached for his wallet anyways, oddly determined that Aramis get the crab if that's what his heart was set on. That was, until Aramis leaned over, his eyes simmering in a way Athos had never seen and his smile turning razor-sharp.

Athos couldn’t say he recognized the smooth and easy tone the exuberant man nailed on like a second skin. He dropped his voice and bartere with Mr. Wu, who let out a high, shocked guffaw that made Athos think of cracked open pecan. Then, somehow, five minutes later Athos had a receipt for crab delivery Tuesday morning at a discount.

“How did you do that?” he demanded, looking down at the receipt in dumb shock.

"Oh. You know," Aramis shrugged.

"No, really. What did you say to him?" Athos scratched at his hair with the hand that wasn't holding the receipt and gave Aramis his best stern glare. It wasn't working as well these days: Aramis just tilted his head and bestowed on him a look that was fonder than Athos could handle.

Aramis shrugged again, in no more mood to talk than Athos was to barter. “Is that octopus?” he diverted, and Athos found himself in front of another stand some yards down. Aramis smiled widely at the putrid red suckers as if Christmas had come early, his eyes wide and dark. Athos felt his knees go weak.

“I haven't gotten to play with octopus in years,” Aramis admitted in a soft voice. Athos rolled his eyes.

“Which one are we getting?” he asked.

Aramis’ small smile became a full-out grin. "Yeah?"

"Sure."

"You don't mind? Full warning—I'm planning on enlisting Porthos into cooking this into turnovers."

"I'll try whatever you want," Athos admitted.

Aramis was practically glowing as he slipped a hand under Athos' arm and waved over the vendor.

He let Aramis buy the damn octopus because it made him happy. Athos was only just realizing he enjoyed being able to spoil them and share with them when those pesky, indulgent moods sprung up like weeds. He had buried all those little knee-jerk reactions when his relationship with Anne had grown to be more about the competition.

Contentment flooded through him, awakening long dormant senses while he watched Porthos putting all the shiny, expensive tools around his kitchen to good use.

Porthos, barefoot and in pajama bottoms protected by an apron, was at the stove when they returned. The smell of peppery, thick gravy and warm biscuits filtered through toward the front door and Athos’ mouth watered. Porthos waved one hand at them both, tasting spoon in his mouth.

Aramis did his best to become a barnacle on Porthos’ back. “Can I try?”

Porthos dipped the spoon back into the grave and offered it over his shoulder. Athos spent a long moment debating whether he should join them before Aramis took the decision out of his hands, reached out, and pulled him into their orbit with his free hand while the other used Porthos’ tasting spoon like a lollipop.

Athos had thought they would have taken their…whatever they were going to call their relationship slowly, integrating Athos in parts and pieces one step at a time. Instead, Aramis and Porthos simply shoved him in headfirst and enjoyed the results. It was hard to argue with the results when, a week later, he inevitably got to wake up to Porthos’ gentle snorting and furnace-like presence; Aramis sat on his other side, idly playing with Athos’ hair. He was already dressed.

“You need a haircut,” Aramis told him quietly. “I think it’s long enough to pull back now.”

Athos groaned and buried his face back in the pillows. Aramis let him whimper in self-pity for a bit before dragging him out of bed. It became their weekly routine after that; Aramis unbelievably wide awake Monday mornings and impatient to roll Athos out of bed for their shopping trip.

He had to say he enjoyed it.

*

Constance groaned when she saw the line outside the restaurant.

“Is that going to be a normal thing?” d’Artagnan asked beside her. He had resisted her efforts to put him into his uniform early, wearing instead a pair of jeans and a ratty t-shirt with a faded logo of some band she had never heard of. She breathed through her teeth like a simmering kettle, and remind herself that this wasn't LA. No one was watching with long-range cameras from the bushes, she wasn't about to greet her staff with a sloppy husband, and d'Artagnan was allowed to make whatever impression he wanted to his new coworkers.

“No,” she grumbled, scratching her fingernails across her forehead. The early lines had to stop, she decided. All it did was stress Athos out and cause her concern to spike every minute the crowd grew bigger. People waiting in line inevitably got bored, and started doing things she couldn't anticipate. Her staff didn’t need that while they were getting ready for the day.

While Constance would have preferred a chair to stand on to raise herself above the crowd, Athos wasn’t a fan of outdoor seating. (“Think of the insects,” he would mutter, shuddering at the very thought.) So instead, she took a step onto the apron of one of the low windows of the building to give herself a boost, braced a hand on the brick, and snapped her fingers a few times.

“Hi folks!” she greeted, letting iron into her voice. She wasn’t in a mood to let any of them argue with her. “We’re not open for another few hours. We appreciate you all choose to dine with us, but we do need a few hours to set up.”

Thankfully, most of the crowd dispersed at that. A few stubborn stragglers tried to keep their feet planted, but Constance politely booted them to the other side of the street. She could just imagine what Athos’ anxiety levels would start to look like if he realized people were about to tear the doors down to get into the restaurant.

Flicking on the lights, she felt her world recenter for a moment. The restaurant looked back at her, warm even in the low morning light, and behind her d'Artagnan followed close enough to feel his warmth at her elbow. This wasn't her old home, that was for sure, but she was starting to feel fond of it. After all the hours she worked, it was entirely familiar by now.

Constance pointed d'Artagnan towards the back.

“Go see if the days linens got dropped off, would you?” she asked. “We’re low on napkins.”

Serge had rearranged the tables before he locked up last night. Constance always made a point to make it known that she’d be able to handle the job herself, but it was still a big help to not have to worry about the arrangement. She started lowering chairs off the table to the ground while d’Artagnan hefted a few linen bags onto the dining room floor.

Together they found the long table cloth at the bottom of the bag, and laid it out over the long run of tables. Their staff sized eleven with d’Artagnan, so she pulled in a few extra chairs and pushed d’Artagnan into one near the end.

She was showing him how to fold the napkins around silverware sets when she heard the kitchen door open.

“Good morning!” she hollered out. Athos banged on the wall in reply rather than answer, and there was a worryingly loud crash as something hit the floor.

Aramis called back before the crashing had a chance to finish. "We're alright! I saved the oysters."

There was a gust of wind as d'Artagnan's head shot up like a bloodhound.

“Oysters?” he asked in a tone strongly reminiscent of a little girl spotting a horse.

“Seriously?” Constance knew d’Artagnan had a weakness for shellfish. He was halfway out of his seat when she reached out, snagged her fingers into his jean pocket, and yanked him back down.

“You can wait the thirty minutes it will take for them to put lunch together,” she scolded.

“But they may need help,” d’Artagnan protested. Constance slapped down more loose napkins in front of him.

“So do we,” she said as the front door slid open. Lucy, already in her uniform and looking far too light and breezy for a day when the temperatures were brushing over 80 degrees, tugged her earbuds out and waved at them.

“Back for another round?” she asked as she bounced over.

“Well, I can’t have you win that hundred without a fight,” D'Artagnan replied as she took a seat and accepted her own share of napkins. Constance felt an odd stab of jealousy, which she immediately slammed a lid on. D’Artagnan was allowed to make friends with the staff. She wasn’t going to interfere with that.

With three hands, the work passed quickly, and by the time they were done most of the rest of the staff had already filtered in. Their only absentee was Samara, who had texted earlier saying she needed to take a few extra hours to study for mid-terms before her shift started.

Aramis stuck his head back out. “Who wants to lend a hand?”

D’Artagnan was up and half way across the room before he even finished speaking. Constance rolled her eyes and helped Lucy pack the napkins away, double-checked the menus, and set down more chairs from their places on top of the tables.

Constance cheered along with the rest of the staff as Aramis and d'Artagnan emerged from the kitchen with wide waiter trays loaded down with dishes and bottles galore. Porthos came after him, a huge dutch oven cradled carefully in his huge hands. Athos got off easiest, he only had to shuttle the bowls and a trivet for the dutch oven.

“Alrighty!” Aramis called everyone to their seats as he set his plates down and distributed them. “Dig in, and feel free to praise me to your heart’s content."

“Because of course your ego needs to be stoked,” Constance replied.

“Only three times a day.”

Athos handed over half of his stack of plates for Constance, than took his place at the head of the table.

“We have a vinaigrette mix with fresh French bread,” he started without preamble. He was never one to waste words. Constance knew the staff understood—Athos didn’t thrive having so many expecting eyes on him.

“Courtesy of Alice?” Emile asked from further down the table.

“No, clearly we made it ourselves, what with our abundant amounts of free time,” Aramis replied as he laid out his and d’Artagnan’s dishes. He rearranged them a few times until they were ordered to his satisfaction.

“As well,” Athos picked back up, readily ignoring Aramis with the ease of experience. “We have blueberry cornbread—yes, there is syrup,” he interrupted himself when, down the table, Jacques’ hand shot up like a student’s on the first day of school. “Oyster lagniappe, and please know Aramis had already attempted every bedroom-related innuendo he could think of and I doubt any of you could reach his level of creativity so please resist the urge.”

“You mean I can’t even try?” Florian complained, garnering a round of laughter even over Athos’ bemused stare. Aramis planted his elbow on the table and turned his bright smile down to the older bartender.

“Do it! I could barely get a laugh out of him all morning.”

For all the amusement in the room, that worried Constance. Athos wasn’t the most boisterous of personalities, but Aramis could usually cause him to crack a smile at least a few times a day. His stress level was probably a lot higher than Constance originally anticipated. She’d have to keep an eye on him; Jacques had taken down more than a few services simply because he'd let a few bad decisions get to him.

Athos hadn't done that yet, but Constance would be wary of it anyways.

“And lastly, a Basque seafood stew,” Athos concluded without fanfare before claiming the seat at the head of the table, with Constance on his left and Porthos on his right. With that rather unceremonious introduction, the family meal began as everyone battled it out for their plates.

There were a few cheese trays laid out every few settings, with tiny bowls of vinegar and olive oil beside them. Constance rearranged the trays to accommodate her planner on the table, which landed them at d'Artagnan's elbow. He helped himself to a bit of bread, dipped it in the dark mixture, and bit into it with an audible _crack_ of the crust.

His eyelashes fluttered closed as he let out a audible, contented 'mmm', and Constance wanted to stab him with a fork. Beside him, Lucy's eyebrows raised, a sudden spark of interest on her face.

Was it too late to switch seats with him? No, that would put him next to Athos, and that could be ten times worse. Maybe she would just die of secondhand embarrassment at his dreadful table manners. She certainly couldn't waste her time blaming his mother, after all.

Her annoyance fled, washed away in a tidal wave of fondness, when he turned to her, happily nodding and ushering a skewed piece of bread her way. Honestly, she was in such a mood today. It's not like he was purposely antagonizing her. She'd just had to deal with it.

She tried a piece herself, and the sharp tang of the vinaigrette had a pleasant sweetness to it. The bread only had a hint of flavor to it, but the crunch of the crust cut through the stickiness and gave the whole bite balance.

"That's not the house balsamic," she noted.

“Nope,” Aramis confirmed, but said offered no other explanation, though his eyes dancing as he tore off a bit of bread for himself. He swirled it through the mixture, tossed on a sliver of hard, sharp cheddar, and munched it down. D’Artagnan made a curious noise and reached out to dip the pad of his finger into the dark slick.

“That’s strawberry,” he promptly identified once he licked his finger off like a heathen. Constance despaired; she knew his father raised him better than this, damnit. “With olive oil?"

Aramis flicked a stray piece of bread at him.

“You’re far too good at that.”

Constance let her shoulders relax and set about putting her plate together. This was what the family meal was about: a chance to eat, drink, and make merry, and all that jazz. Not this...whatever it was she was feeling today. It wasn’t suppose to wind spikes of pain down her back and keep her mouth in a permanent frown.

Constance tried her best to shake out the glum thoughts and enjoy her food.

Athos, sitting quietly in his seat with his chin in his hand, carefully watched the reactions of those around him. Constance didn't quite duck out of his gaze but it was a close thing. She had a feeling he’d be analyzing their enjoyment down to the last crumb. She sensed a menu change on the horizon, and took a moment to jot down the day’s meal so she would be prepared for it when Athos inevitably sprang it on her.

"Did Aramis make this cornbread?” D’Artagnan guessed.

"Lucky guess,” Aramis accused.

“It was not!” d’Artagnan shot back. “You just season things later than you should.”

Aramis fixed on him like a viper who had just found a new piece of prey to toy with. He straightened in his seat and tilted himself bodily forward, doing that thing he did when he took up all the available space in front of his target. There was no one else to focus on but him. She didn’t have to look to see d’Artagnan taking on the personality of a stubborn bull.

Constance just suppressed her irritation; she couldn't deal with this right now.

"There's better things here than the cheese trays," she pointed out, then added slightly more manipulatively, "You should go try Athos' seafood stew. It's even better than his chowder, and he springs for the fancy fish sometimes."

“Fancy how?” d’Artagnan, contrary to the last, decided to latch onto. Athos shrugged.

“It doesn’t matter how much fancy fish I use if I douse the whole thing in white wine.”

“Because if you get us boozy enough you don’t have to worry about flavor palettes, huh?” Aramis challenged good-naturedly.

“Oh!” That seemed to spark something in Porthos, who rose to his feet. “Knew I forgot something. Order up!” he hollered down the table. Constance winced; when Porthos hollered, he could send bears scrambling for cover.

D’Artagnan blinked in surprise, but the rest of the table promptly started throwing out drink orders. Porthos, one hand braced on the back of his chair and his ear cocked, listened attentively, repeated a few orders, than nodded with all the determination that characterized him.

“Coming right up,” he affirmed. “Pup? What about you?”

D’Artagnan gapped a few times, but Constance nudged him in the ribs. “Water is an option,” she offered. It had taken her a little bit to relax enough around these people to drink before work. And she understood it was almost a necessary—all the options thrown Porthos’ way were right off the menu, and more often then not customers asked for their opinions on the drinks. But even with that, she couldn’t imagine it was an easy question for a young kid new to their dynamic to handle.

“I’ll stick with water."

"Constance!" Porthos boomed, turning towards her and buoyantly dragging out the 'a' in her name. "Your turn. How 'bout I make you a real drink? Something fancy?"

"I'm fine with wine.” Someone—she suspected Athos—had chosen a nice, light Spanish white wine to pair with the meal and Constance was enjoying the flavor on her tongue.

"Come on—it's just a staff meal. Look, I'll make it as virgin as Aramis' sense of humor isn't. Just let me make you something fun."

"I'm fine, Porthos."

"I'll crack open the expensive wine Athos hid in his office," he tempted her.

Constance gave a sigh. "I put it there to hide it from him."

Porthos laughed the way he cooked—so well everyone had to pay attention. Constance tried to purse her lips to keep from smiling too wide. It was a shame to begrudge Porthos, who worked harder than any ten chefs, anything that brightened his day, but she really did feel a bit self-conscious when the whole table turned down to stare at them.

“Suit yourself,” he said. He headed for the bar, and began putting on a splendid show for them as he mixed his rooster of drinks. D’Artagnan shifted in his seat.

Constance fought the urge to roll her eyes. “Come on,” she ordered, rising to her feet, plate and planner in hand. “You know you want to lend a hand.” And take a closer look, she thought, but didn’t add. D’Artagnan already had a hard enough time admitting what he wanted, his pride wounded like a paw with a thorn stuck through it when he had to admit to anything.

“You know me so well,” he muttered, grabbing his plate and following Porthos to the bar.

“Gonna keep me company?” Porthos asked, already elbows deep in vodka and ice.

“We’re just here to mooch,” d’Artagnan explained. He grabbed one of the bar seats, and proceeded to display horrible table manners as he planted his elbows on the bar top and ate with his hands. Somehow, it didn't ruin the affect of his long neck arching back as he slurped back a plate of oyster half shells.

Constance rolled her eyes at herself. She propped her planner up against a napkin holder and scanned for line items anew while d’Artagnan watched Porthos work, occasionally licking the cornbread dressing off his fingers.

"Not that I have anything against cornbread," d'Artagnan started, and Constance almost responded that she'd never accuse him of such a thing when he continued, "But how come Athos didn't use the same starter for the oyster topping as Aramis did for the blueberry cornbread?"

"Can a chef not have a secret anymore?" Porthos' face twisted up as he shook up a bright yellow drink. "Well, come on then. What was it? The parsley cut too finely? Too much white pepper?"

"Actually the seasoning's perfect on these," d'Artagnan sassed at him, as if defending Athos' culinary abilities could win the battle on its own.

Porthos rolled his eyes, not bothering to look at d'Artagnan as he plated a tray of drinks. “What was your clue then?"

"No lemons were used in the making of the oyster's cornbread."

"What? He—," Porthos started to defend him but then broke off into a chuckle. "Yeah. Yeah, actually, I did see him add some lemon zest to the blueberry cornbread. He likes to use em' in everything. Know what drink he ordered?"

"Is it a lemon drop?"

"Yeah, smart ass. It is." Porthos smiled fondly down on the drink in question before shaking himself out of it.

“Here,” He pushed a full tray of drinks towards d'Artagnan. “Be a good lad and go drop those off.”

D’Artagnan groaned, but hopped off his bar stool nonetheless.

“You two just want my oysters,” he grumbled as he picked up the delicate cocktail glasses. “Who had the Mai Tai?”

“You caught me.” Constance toasted him with her modest glass of wine and turned back to Porthos, who had an all-too-knowing look on his face.

Dread dropped a hole through her stomach, and she willed her face to stay bland as she took an emergency sip of wine.

Porthos didn't say anything at first. He played with his earlobe, tugging against the golden loop earring there. He made to grab something from the shelf behind him, but every nerve in her being sparked back into awareness by the tension in his back. Constance was so focused on grounding herself, just making her body relax, that when he turned with an orange in hand she didn't know what to think.

He flicked the skin of the orange, making a show of listening to the gentle _thunk_ it produced. Then he grabbed a paring knife and, starting at the top, cut a perfect, continuous coil out of the peel.

He set the peel in front of her like a slinky, but she was too afraid to touch it. How had he cut it so fine without some sort of a channel cutter? Intellectually, Constance knew that some of the things Porthos baked required a delicate touch, but to have proof of his carefulness was always surprising. His hands always seems too big to handle the delicate work.

It was almost rude of him to start talking then:

"Thanks for finding that one for us," Porthos gestured with his knife at d'Artagnan across the bar. "I know we're basically still as sunk as we were before Adele quit, but it's a load off Athos that he didn't have to do it himself. Hell, he even seems to like this one. And I know Aramis likes him."

“He is working out, isn’t he,” Constance muttered, proud despite her nerves. Stop asking questions, she silently ordered Porthos. I don’t want to go any further down that road.

“You got something on your mind?” she asked instead, going for the obvious undercut. Porthos snorted.

“You’re unholy good at people-reading."

“You’re not particularly challenging,” she replied without guile. Porthos never cared if she was blunt. Point in face, he huffed out a soft laugh and started on his next drink.

“Yeah, well.” His face was open and honest, but his fidgeting caught her off-guard. Porthos usually didn’t fidget.

“Can I ask ya something?”

“Sure, shoot.”

"Show me how to do the books with you."

That surprised Constance enough for a double-take. "What?"

"I know you and Athos go through the numbers for the day at the end of shift," Porthos leaned against the counter, edging his half-made drink away. "I used to do most of the accounting and balancing on the food truck. I mean, Aramis was the one who showed me how to do the budget. 'N together we figured out all the price points on the stock. That's enough to start learning with, yeah?"

He looked up at her hopefully. Constance tried not to reel too much in the face of his offer; it was sweet, really. She just had to combat the sudden flare of possessiveness that clawed out underfoot. She didn’t delude herself into thinking she excelled at her job out of the simple goodness of her heart. For better or for worse, she was cutthroat enough to make the hard decisions between quality and price. She also hadn't missed the part where she'd made all of her boss's priorities _her_ priorities. Sure, she was a valuable employee, but Athos wasn't so beaten down that he wouldn't eventually regain his footing get some day. Then whose problems would she tackle?

Constance drew in a deep breath to refocus herself. Her problems weren't Porthos' to deal with, but apparently Athos' were.

Porthos waited for her to collect her thoughts, his face earnest but tensed, but the wait wasn't long because the real flaw with his request was literally written across his face.

"Don't you already work all the possible hours you can?" Her voice was light. Free from judgment, that was the key for talking to employees, even if _he wasn't her employee._ "I consolidate your hours with Alice, you know, and your weekly total is about double what a sane person should work. You'll burn out if you keep this up."

"So will Athos," Porthos pointed out bluntly.

"Athos is the owner. Sometimes that's just what you have to do to run a business."

Porthos gave her a searching look, his lips pouting as he thought. He grabbed his abandoned glass, splashing something over some sugar cubes and muddling it all together.

"How 'bout this. Every Monday, him and Aramis go to the markets, right?"

Constance nodded, curious to see where he was going.

"Then at the end of the month, you're the one stuck running around, figurin' out where all his receipts wandered off too and which vendors already got paid by cash or if he used the credit card-"

"Actually, if you could steal that credit card away from him, I'd be much appreciated," Constance ground out between her teeth.

"I'll do you one better," Porthos grinned while he plunked some ice cubes into his glass. "I'll reconcile the whole damn credit card statement for you. Copies of receipts and everything."

She gaped at him. Then she laughed. "Impossible. You'd probably have to dig half the receipts out of Aramis' pockets."

A flush danced across his cheeks but he gave her a dirty smile, “You really think that’s a problem for me?"

Constance felt her own face burn red. “Well, I’ll probably have an easier time of it than I do. So you'll get rid of one of my headaches," she clarified, "In return for what? And don't think I failed to notice that you skipped right over the 'working too much' part of what I said."

He turned to grab a bottle of whiskey and ignored it a second time.

"Just show me a few times a week what you and Athos talk about," he shrugged. "Payroll. Taxes. Staffing problems. I want to learn it all. I want to help. I'll learn it all real fast, I promise."

The thing is that Constance believed him. It hurt to think about, but it had been a long time since Constance felt she could take someone at their word. While she considered what to do, Porthos sliced a round wheel out of his orange and garnished it on the lip of his glass. He placed grabbed his orange peel slinky and topped it on his drink.

Then he slid the drink in front of her. "Tada! An Old Fashioned."

Her jaw worked as she ground her teeth together, trying to stamp down a torrent of feelings she couldn't unleash. She hid her mouth behind her hand until she could compose herself, and reached out.

"I don't think the orange is supposed to be cut into a swirly top and a wheel," she pretended to bemoan the poor drink's predicament. "I'm pretty sure you're just supposed to slice it."

"Well, I made it more fun."

"Maybe you do have too much time in your day left."

Porthos scoffed, but his face seemed contemplative.

"What about you, Constance? Do you got any free time these days?"

Constance would not look at d'Artagnan again. Easier than they had started to slip, she could feel her walls staging a defense around her as she asked, "Why?"

“Do you mind if I give Alice your number?” Porthos asked. Constance let her surprise splash across her face without restraint.

“Why?”

“I think you two could get along." There was that blunt honesty again. Not that she was envious. “Ya’ll are similar.”

“Oh?"

“Yeah, she. Well, she inherited the shop after her husband passed, you know. It took her a while to get her feet. She always thought she’d be a stay-at-home wife, had her life all planned out. It just kinda sounds like, maybe you and she could touch base.”

Huh. Constance had spoken with Alice only a handful of over the phone, usually to confirm orders or iron out billing issues or fuss over payroll. She couldn’t even pick the woman out of a crowd. But she knew Porthos thought her a good friend, and if he thought they should meet Constance wouldn’t shoot him down.

“I’d be alright with that,” she tentatively approved, feeling better when Porthos smiled at her. Alice probably wouldn’t reach out anyway.

*

Athos knew he was dancing with fire. His relationship with Anne had been his last long-term relationship, and when she'd left without him to follow her ambitions, the dead weight he became only served to plummet him further into a spiraling depression. Tréville, his old culinary teacher, had only managed to pull him back with news of his retirement and a desire to see The Garrison pass on into good hands.

“It would do you good to get back in the ring,” Tréville told him over lunch while Athos squinted against the window light and tried to remember the last meal he'd had that wasn't from a bottle. That he had to think about it so hard probably meant it had been longer than appropriate.

“I didn’t do too well last time I was in the ring,” he said, picking at the sandwich in front of him. He knew Tréville could cook, which is why it was so odd that the leftover meatball sub he'd prepared tasted like a travesty. Maybe he'd rotted out his palate with drinking, but the meat seemed overly fragrant with garlic and oregano. And soft, much softer than Athos would prefer, which was strange since he knew Tréville had a superb fried meatball recipe.

"Is your fryer broken? Or your measuring spoons, Christ. Did you dump a whole bottle of Italian seasoning in this?" Athos asked, too offended and stupid with his stomach rolling to realize he'd walked headlong into a trap.

Tréville raised his eyebrow at him. His former teacher leaned back in his chair with his arms crossed, as if he'd just imparted a vital lesson.

"Too over-seasoned for your refined palate, is it?"

"I assumed you were just catering to the tourists these days, Chef," Athos bit back.

"A good chef can make people like good food. You wouldn't happen to know one who'd be interested in acquiring a restaurant, would you?"

"Not these days."

Tréville's face sunk in disappointment. Athos forced himself to take another bite of his sub in self-inflicted punishment.

Tréville waved him away from his meal, pushing a much lighter plate of bruschetta at him. He watched as Athos inspected it, dabbed his finger against the top and tasted it— _much_ better, not overly seasoned, no overpowering flavors even with the balsamic, just the right pinch of salt to cut through all that acid—before Tréville had to interrupt his moment.

“No reason not to try again. You’ve got the drive and the skills.”

“And the money,” Athos muttered, finally taking a satisfyingly crunchy bite. Tréville gave him a look that said if Athos were anyone else Tréville would have boxed his ears.

“That too,” Tréville admitted after Athos only continued to eat around his scathing look. “I know good chefs who don’t have the capital to undertake the restaurant. But, more importantly, even if they did I wouldn’t ask them. Being a chef and being a restaurateur are two different things.”

Athos knew he would say yes even as Tréville continued to talk. The desire to get back on the line was too strong, and each day he spent moping around his apartment trying to forget the last decade of his life only caused it to grow stronger. But he also figured he could make his mentor dangle for a little bit, if only to get back at the man for all the potatoes he made Athos peel during his education.

When he took over The Garrison, it was every bit as intense and hectic as he had thought. He couldn’t help but think Tréville had been wrong and he was in over his head. There was so much—dealing with the bank for the property transfer, designing the menu, overseeing the renovations (and the accompanying demolition required for it), hiring staff, redesigning the menu, and doing battle with the avalanche of suppliers he needed to network.

He could barely stop to breathe.

It was a miracle he wasn't mugged on the night when, drunk and desolate and trying to find a few moments of peace, he stumbled in the direction he thought would lead to home and instead wound up at an innocuous little food truck, realizing he was starving.

If Athos closed his eyes, he could still taste that kindly made veggie wrap, even through the fog of alcoholic memories. He remembered being gobsmacked that the best thing he had eaten all year came out of a dingy little food truck. The next morning, nursing a massive hangover and toying with the borrowed, battered green water bottle, he wondered if part of it was his own admittedly glazed memories. It couldn’t have been that good.

He pulled up the website on the card and scrolled through the reviews. Athos knew he should take them with a grain of salt, but he was blown away by the amount of positive feedback. Almost every comment made mention of the quality of food and being well worth the effort to track them down where ever they popped up on the map. He scanned through the comments with a good amount of trepidation:

**OMG SO GOOD!!**

**Delicious with lots of flavor! Their italian wrap had a little too much garlic so my husband wasn’t a fan, but their greek veggie combo is to die for!**

**you can order gluten-free**

**Two suggestions:**  
**-order ahead**  
**-enjoy the view while ur waiting**

**Promise you WON'T be disappointed**

**Tots worth the wait—gotta keep the alerts up though! They pop up anywhere!**

**Gotta say, wish they’d open a store front. It would be so much easier than running around town after them**

**i’d say order over the phone or on the app. they’ve run out of ingredients on me before. super bummer**

**Stay away from the owner, he’s completely crazy. He couldn’t even take my order without criticizing my choices. The other two employees are great though, and are usually the only ones working. They know their shit. Order ahead!**

Ideas, unbidden, boiled forth. Athos tapped their business card against his lips and thought carefully about his next decision.

The tiny blinking dot on his phone led him towards the Superdome, where he found the poor pair about ready to keel over in the sun. And here he was, the asshole who'd ran off with their water bottle. Honestly though, who would outfit a truck like this without a cooling system at the very least?

Athos took a good look at the circles under Aramis’ eyes and the dejected slump across Porthos’ shoulders. He'd take them to lunch first. It wouldn't be fair to proposition them when they weren't at their best.

They'd go somewhere downscale and comfortable, somewhere that would put them at ease. Only every option he considered he discarded: too far away, too busy at this time of day, too loud to have a conversation that should best be kept quiet and intimate.

He could take them to someone else's restaurant. But he didn't want to.

His hands shook when he opened the door of The Garrison to let them in, and he wasn't a good enough liar to tell himself it was just from the drinking. The building was a mess, with construction underway for the renovation of the dining room. The walls around the kitchen were open, giving room for the electrical and the plumbing to be reworked. There were a million little touches to be added, because Tréville was a fantastic restaurateur but he preferred Italian cuisine, and his space reflected it. Athos’ taste ran differently.

He hadn't even decided on his menu yet. After a professional career spent in classical French restaurants, simple logic dictated that he should stay in his wheelhouse, yet every time he sat down to plan he saw the menu at La Fronge. Would it seem too much like copying his old menu if this one featured a risotto? Duck confit—good idea, bad idea, or were Tréville's weekly visits just giving him flashbacks to culinary school?

Athos had designed four different, uninspired menus now and each one of them had been balled up and thrown away in a drunken haze.

Despite that, he could get the kitchen in order—no matter what ended up cooking, he knew he wouldn't need a huge, brick laid and open fire oven in the center. Now, he figured he could fit three chefs into the kitchen. Four, if they all liked each other.

He converted the space to stainless steel worktops and coveted, high-end appliances. The previous floor was a checkered character of mismatched and colorful tiles that Tréville had ended up incorporating throughout the restaurant, but it was a bitch to clean. The new floor was simpler, cleaner, and he wouldn't slip on it any time soon. Add to that a new paint job, and Athos had a workspace he wasn’t embarrassed to show off to his potential new employees.

“Well, it looks like you got your priorities straight,” Aramis chirped. He slid some of the heavy-duty plastic the contractors had left behind off a nearby stool. Then he pushed Porthos into it, and hopped onto the counter beside him.

“The details are still working themselves out,” Athos replied as he rummaged through his pantry. The front room was chaos, and there was no point pretending he wasn't working with half an idea. But that was for later. He had a plan and an eclectic stock of food, lunch was something he could manage.

A thought, worn with familiarity and comfort, struck him when he came across the Arborio rice. He could've rolled his eyes at himself, but he started collecting the staples all the same. Garlic, onions, celery. Dried porcini mushrooms. Armagnac.

“How long have you been at the food truck?” he asked as he elbowed his way out of the pantry.

“Little over a year,” Aramis replied vaguely, craning his head to see what Athos had smuggled in his arms. Athos dropped the ingredients on the counter and quickly dragged a stock pot onto the front burner to block their view. He heard Aramis huff.

He lined up his ingredients, drew out another pan, kicked the oven up to 450.

“And before that?” He got the stock and the porcinis in a saucepan, kicked up the heat.

“Worked as a bartender,” Porthos explained.

“Traveled,” was Aramis’ contribution. Neither of them seemed to want to elaborate.

Athos focused on sharpening his knives and resisted letting his complete and utter disbelief cross his face. No way their culinary skills were only a year old. At Le Fronge, he wouldn’t have considered letting anyone into his kitchen without a culinary degree, references from three other established chefs, and ten years of work experience.

But this restaurant was a new start. Tréville’s main complaint about his education (traditional, ingrained, expected education) was that he often let propriety overwhelm his common sense and better judgment. Athos needed to not stumble over himself if he was going to hire them, and he was going to. He needed to remember to be impulsive.

He looked down at his ingredients. That didn't mean he couldn't _cook_ something more traditional. It wouldn't be awe-inspiring, but it would be delicious and he knew how to make it like the back of his hand. He quickly chopped down the carrots, celery and split the diced onions into two prep bowls. The garlic bulb he rolled in hand, contemplating the two sagging chefs. This wasn't the quickest recipe he had under his belt, but he was sure they'd love it. He just needed to keep them in the land of the living. Before he could question himself, he tossed the garlic at Aramis, who caught it with lagging reflexes and would have stumbled off the counter if Porthos hadn't caught him by the thigh.

Aramis' lips crooked up in a grin, his humor bring the light back into his tired eyes. He cradled the garlic bulb to his heart and batted his eyelashes. "Oh, Athos. You shouldn't have."

"Start peeling. I need eight chopped and six more still in the shell."

"You mean I can't just hang it over my door?"

"Then you could get the tomatoes cored and crushed,” Athos continued over the jape.

"Aye-aye, Captain."

Athos ignored him after he took up the knife. "Porthos, there's some fish heads in the walk-in. Would you mind grabbing that and the lobster?"

Porthos blinked away from watching Aramis roll up his sleeves and looked at Athos. For an uncomfortable moment, Athos caught himself staring. Under the strident lights of the kitchen there was no hiding the unflattering lines of stress around his eyes and lips. Even so, his face was so soft and open. Athos would be the first to admit he could be a little domineering in the kitchen, but looking at that face made Athos want to rustle up every cynical barb he had inside and burn it.

But Porthos shrugged his shoulders at his request and moved to stand. The world came back into focus. The pot in front of him was already starting to boil, and Aramis appeared at his side with a commandeered knife and his hair pulled back. He started making deft work of the garlic.

Athos was quick to catch up, chopping the fresh chanterelle mushrooms into bite-size pieces and tossing it with oil, thyme, salt, pepper. He set that aside on a baking sheet.

He held up his prep bowl to Aramis. "Shelled cloves, please?"

Aramis didn't drop them in so much as present them balanced on the edge of a knife with a wink and drop them overboard. "What's next?"

Porthos gave an appreciative whistle from the walk-in fridge.

"I think I found your Christmas presents, Aramis," Porthos said with a toothy grin as he let the fish trays drop heavy onto the prep station. Aramis peaked over the plastic wrap, then his head whipped back around to Athos, openly interested and his cat-like eyes more wide awake than Athos had seen even last night.

"Well," Aramis hummed pointedly, flicking the top tray. “You don’t see hake out here much. Mostly a European fish.”

“It shows up a lot in French cuisine,” Athos defended, pulling the fish heads towards him. “Can’t really do a lot without it.”

“Is that what kind of food you're thinking of serving?” Aramis asked. He hovered over shoulder as Athos moved to drain the stock, setting the porcinis aside and putting the stock back on the range over a low flame.

“Haven’t quite figured that out yet. This used to be an Italian restaurant, but a friend sold it over to me. Not much now, but I’m working to get it up and running by the fall.”

Really, the food in the pantry was a collection of odds and ends. Tréville’s seafood supplier hadn’t gotten notice of the change-over, and while his menu hadn’t featured heavily in fish, Athos now had a few extra boxes of the stuff and a bill that made his eyebrows skyrocket up his forehead. Everything else in the pantry was a mixture of heavy Italian flavors, and the few ingredients Athos insisted be in any kitchen he worked in.

“Duck fat,” he told Porthos as the man made a curious noise watching him spoon three heaps of it into a large saucepan. It was a close to gold as Athos had ever come across, and he loved working with it.

“Smells great,” Porthos admired from over his shoulder. The fragrance of onions and celery hit the air as Athos overturned one of his prep bowls. He started a second pan, and started melting the butter.

“That’s the garlic,” Aramis responded from Athos' other shoulder. “It’ll do that every time. Why do you think I try to add it to everything I make?”

“I just assumed you had an undiscussed fear of vampires.”

“You know what? I very well could and no one in this swamp city would blame me for one second.”

When the butter melted in the second pan, Athos added the second bowl of onions and passed the spoon to Porthos, gesturing for him to stir. He kept one hand moving the ingredients in the first pot while he pulled the some of the herbs over.

"Aramis, if you'd be so kind as to bring over the fish heads and the lobsters?"

Aramis looked far too happy to be tossing in the hake heads and the lobster bodies without their savory claws, but then Athos supposed he himself looked equally over-enthused to toss in handfuls of parsley, thyme, and bay leaves. That done, Athos passed the stirring duty over to Aramis. He ripped open the bag of Arborio rice with his teeth, and had to reach around Porthos to add it in.

"Just keep it moving. We just want to get it lightly toasted," Athos instructed. Porthos stood just tall enough to make it difficult to look over his shoulder, so Athos had to balance himself against the counter and peer around him.

"The lobster's getting red over here," Aramis called from Porthos' other side. Athos grabbed the Armagnac, circling back to the other side.

He could appreciate Aramis' posture in the kitchen. The chef had been smiling and charming on the food truck, and bantering and spritely since they'd closed up. But standing over the range, he had a focus in his eyes like Athos would expect to see from a sharpshooter. There was a zone some chefs got into when they cooked, and Aramis was definitely engaged.

As he tipped the bottle of Armagnac over the pan, Athos had the suspicious inclination that Aramis was memorizing all of this for later, and he had to take a hit from the bottle to settle his oddly tense nerves and the curl of heat in his stomach.

In his head, the timer went off: rice. He moved back to Porthos and swapped the Armagnac for a dry white wine, only questioning himself a little before adding some to measuring cup. Just in case he needed help getting through lunch.

Athos poured a generous amount from the bottle over the rice. The pan sizzled, and Porthos gave out an appreciative groan that Athos didn't have time to admire. 

_Two minutes._

"Porthos, keep stirring that until the wine evaporates." Athos grabbed the crushed plum tomatoes and readied the water, bringing both to Aramis' side. "Aramis, after I add the wine to yours, you'll have about six minutes before you add these. The water should just cover it. Bring it up to a boil, then drop to a simmer. Then you can add the lobster claws."

Aramis shot him a quirk of a smile, which Athos couldn't resist returning with one of his own.

_One minute._

"Porthos," Athos said, coming to stand back at his elbow with chicken stock at the ready. "Are you ready for the fun part?"

"Go for it," Porthos rumbled, watching the pan intently. When nothing happened, he glanced at Athos.

Athos shrugged sheepishly, stock still in hand. "Twenty seconds."

Porthos nodded solemnly back at him. When Athos' sense of timing alerted him, fine-tuned to a tee as it was after years of making this recipe on a nightly basis, Athos slowly added in the first half cup of stock.

Porthos kept up a slow stir as Athos readied the second cup. Where Aramis wore his professionalism around him like a favorite jacket, Porthos clearly made up for his lack of experience with hungry focus and good intuition. Athos watched him experiment how fast he stirred, moving a little faster then slower, before settling at about the pace Athos would have suggested.

"We're waiting for it to absorb," Athos muttered, face close to Porthos' shoulder as he leaned over the pan. "Should take about two minutes. Tell me when you think it's ready."

Porthos didn't answer. Together, they both watched until the bottom of the pan started to appear again, the rice beginning to soak up the liquid. Athos' mental timer ticked its alarm, and just before he could say something Porthos spoke up.

"I think now's good."

Athos added more and watched as Porthos resume an even pace, making sure his mixture didn't break. He had patience—a surprisingly rare quality in a chef.

It was time to get the rest of it going, Athos decided. He grabbed the prepared tray of mushrooms and shelled garlic, sliding it in the oven. He made a quick dive into the walk-in to grab the hake filets, and when he popped back out Porthos motioned for him to add more stock.

Athos checked against his mental timer—right again. And the rice was still looking good. Athos added another half cup.

They continued in silence while Athos gradually added the rest of the stock. He was right: Porthos had very good instincts, even if he seemed more nervous the longer they went. As the rice swelled up ever so delicately, Porthos gripped the spoon tighter and tighter in that massive hand of his, but he didn't falter.

Athos had heard Aramis humming to himself when he added his lobster claws, but when he looked up he saw the man had shifted to lean against the counter, watching them cook even as he attentively poked at his own pot. He was more relaxed, but those dark, soulful eyes were sharp with speculation.

When the rice hit that perfect blend of creamy and tender, Athos guided Porthos to move it off the heat before it could hit the point of no return.

"It looks good," Athos said with an approving nod. "Go ahead and grab the parmesan cheese and the crème fraîche. Aramis, it should be time to pull out the lobster claws. Strain it and get the liquid back on the stove at medium-high heat, then take a seat. We'll have the risotto plated up in just a few minutes. I'm sure you're both starving."

Athos felt more than saw them trading stares as he ducked to pull the tray out of the oven. He chopped both the porcinis from earlier and the roasted mushrooms. The garlic, he peeled and mashed. All of it was stirred together with a healthy portion of parmesan and créme fraîche, and he had a perfect mushroom risotto. Twenty-two minutes well-used.

Athos wavered for a second before he remembered where he had stashed some of the unpacked utensils. It was embarrassing to admit but after eating his own meals alone in the kitchen more often than not over the past few weeks, he was looking forward to the company.

“Eat,” Athos ordered, shoving the two plates of risotto at them. He had to shoo Aramis away from the hake filets before he'd take his bowl. “It’ll tide you over.”

“For what?” Porthos asked, curious, as he tentatively took his first bite. Athos internally cackled in delight as his eyes widened. Porthos looked down into his bowl as if it were a miracle and then up at the still simmering stock pot as he put two and two together.

“Oh God, there’s more food comin'?”

“Yep,” Athos smirked, checking on the stew—still not quite the right consistency. Porthos looked like he would have said more, but his gaze dropped to his bowl and he took another bite, attention diverted.

Aramis knocked against Porthos as he sat down at his side. Then he tried his bowl and elbowed Porthos sharply in the side. They shared a look, both nodding like loons, before they returned to their respective meals in silence.

Porthos and Aramis both inhaled the risotto. Athos, more used to people commenting on their likes and dislikes on his recipes, found the relative quiet unnerving. Grabbing their water bottles, he refilled them from the filtered tap to give his hands something to do. Aramis’ bottle was still far too full, like he'd barely touched it, so Athos shoved it back at the man hoping he would take a hint.

Athos despaired when he took two sips and set it down in favor of the risotto. Next to him, Porthos chugged from his with his head thrown back, baring the plain of his scruffy neck.

Athos had to turn to face the lifeless fish for a minute.

The hake from Tréville’s suppliers wasn’t the best; frozen and about a day past when Athos would have preferred to use it, but he wouldn't be choosy with something he'd sort of accidentally paid for. Slicing out enough fillets for his purpose, he ran his finger along the meat in one last check for bones.

“Gonna keep the skins on?” Aramis prodded. He had the plate up to his chin, all but shoving the risotto into his mouth. Athos was glad he had decided on courses for lunch—they both looked too starved for anything less.

That didn't mean Athos missed the bright gleam in Aramis' eyes that spelled 'troublemaker.' Athos got another pan ready with more duck fat. “That was the plan."

“Still, it must be something more affordable for you,” Aramis countered, playful and sharp. "Ever think of substituting haddock or sole?”

“Haddock doesn’t really preserve well,” Athos dodged, dragging the lobster claws and tails onto his cutting board. “And sole fillets would be too small for the texture I want.”

He dropped the fillets into the duck fat, feeling that the satisfying sizzle only helped to make his point. Then he cracked open the first lobster tail, and shucked the hard skin off with a practiced motion. He could feel Aramis' laser-like attention on him. assessing every motion of his knifework as he cut the meat into medallions.

“Then let me tell you about this lovely fish called cod,” Aramis volleyed. “Cheap, easily obtainable, thick fillets, and all around a better choice for commercial use."

Athos let his nose wrinkle despite himself. Aramis didn’t bother holding back his laughter and Porthos snorted alongside him.

“I’ll think about it,” Athos ceded. _Cod?_ The only thing he could recommend about cod is that it made for good fish and chips.

“Your other option is monkfish,” Aramis pressed as he speared a stray mushroom off his plate. Porthos looked at him fondly, and sneaked a mushroom off Aramis' plate for himself.

“Then I may as well use it throughout,” Athos parried, flipping the fillets. “Putting lobster and poor man’s lobster side-by-side is only going to upset folks.”

That actually stopped Aramis, who opened his mouth to rebute Athos and clicked his teeth shut as he tried to find another angle to attack, only for Porthos to intervene.

“Go with the cod,” Porthos nodded decisively as he all but licking his plate clean. “If nothing else, I know some great beer batter recipes that would go great with ‘em."

Athos looked down at the lobster he'd plated into two wide bowls and tried to picture it on a menu that also featured fish and chips. The fillets had turned a nice golden brown, and he added them to the bowls with a sprinkle of seasoning. Was it actually possible he'd never done a beer-battered recipe in his life?

The thick sauce was poured over the lobster meat and hake. It smelled divine. Even with help he was proud of it. But he couldn't help but wonder if he could have done it simpler.

He gave each bowl a quick wipe down, grabbed the larger spoons from the utensils, and presented it to his guests.

“Basque seafood stew,” he introduced as he set each bowl down.

He refused to let his fretting show. He didn't like admitting that he felt like showing off, and he hated that it felt like he was missing something obvious.

With his elbows propped onto the countertop, Porthos leaned over his bowl and flaked apart his fish with intent written clear on his face. Athos suspected he could copy exactly what he had just witnessed without too many mistakes. He was sure Aramis wouldn't even need to copy him.

Aramis met his eyes when he tried his first bite. Athos didn't back down, waiting patiently for Aramis to rally his opinions.

"It's a little heavy," he started critically, but there was nothing mean about the smile he gave Athos as he rested his chin on his hands. "But then, that's the kind of sacrifice I like to see a guy make when he throws around a promise like duck fat."

"And French food is supposed to be heavy," Athos jabbed back, enjoying himself.

"Just so," Aramis' smile was practically sunk into his hands. "And the fish is good. Nice texture; acceptably cooked."

Athos could deal with that. "Why thank you."

"That means he loves it," Porthos budged in. Aramis squawked in indignation, and Porthos poked him in the side.

"This one's picky, you know? Ain't no one who cooks fish good enough for him these days. Or shrimp."

"I am not picky! It's the world that's biased. If people would just get over this love affair with steak, I wouldn't have to suffer shrimp scampi drowning in butter. _Salted butter_ , Athos," Aramis pressed forward to share his horror with him. "They used salted butter. And then they added salt. I only got one lemon wedge."

"My parents used this caterer once," Athos started, careful to keep his voice very matter-of-fact. "Very trendy menu, some sort of Asian fusion. My mother tricked me into trying this appetizer by telling me it was like popcorn shrimp. It was supposed to be shrimp tempura."

Athos leaned forward and Aramis mirrored his motion.

"Imitation crab."

Aramis' jaw dropped. _"No me diga."_

"Oh, come on," Porthos muttered around a mouthful of lobster. He pushed Aramis' bowl pointedly back at him. “You’re in New Orleans, you know. We're hardly lacking in supply for good product," he waved a hand at the counter with its discarded fish heads and lobster shells. "If you want something better, just put it on the menu."

"Put what on the menu?” Athos suddenly backpedalled, taking in the scope of the conversation rather than enjoying the closeness of it.

Porthos blinked at him. “Great seafood, right? Why don’t you just cook what you know?”

Athos’ first thought came flying out of left field: His parents hated seafood. If he ran a seafood restaurant, they would never come for a visit. Why hadn’t he thought of that before?

Because he worked along a shore line. Because he'd be neck-deep in other seafood restaurants. You couldn't throw a rock in New Orleans without hitting some crustacean-related gimmick. That didn’t even include the higher end restaurants in the area.

None of which would have his culinary background at the helm, he realized. Athos ran through the list of every A-List chef in the area he'd had the misfortune to meet, his mind pulling up rival menus and recipes with the clarity he'd been lacking in his earlier redesigns.

French. Seafood. A little upscale, maybe, but that would come from passion.

Athos watched as Porthos quit pretending to sneak around, instead grabbing Aramis' spoon and finishing the risotto for him. Aramis, in turn, kept tasting pieces of lobster, then a piece of hake, then another piece of lobster. Looking for textural differences, then.

Cod, Athos thought, unraveling the possibilities. Beer battered cod. Maybe not popcorn shrimp. In a shivering jolt of inspiration, he looked at the risotto and his mind took one giant leap forward: shrimp and grits. Fried oyster po'boys. Real crab cakes. Why not?

"Before we move on to talking about those job offers," Athos started, falling into business mode as the pieces of the menu started falling into place. "I have a question for you two."

He wasn't sure the nervous glance they gave each other was warranted, but they shrugged and motioned for him to continue.

"How do you feel about traditional Southern cooking?"

If nothing worked out here, Athos would cross that bridge when he got to it. He supposed he could always give up and become a private chef, even if his blood curdled at the thought.

Five months later, Athos had a menu he was proud of and a finished, full restaurant that was so successful it was driving him up the wall. He had two partners in the kitchen and a warm bed at night. On Monday mornings, he knew without opening his eyes that the heavy arm around him belonged to Porthos. The soft pattering from the kitchen was Aramis, waiting for him get a move on so they could go out and enjoy the day together, either at the markets or the exchange or the docks. How had he gotten this far in _five months._

He had a life before The Garrison, he knew. He had a life before Porthos and Aramis, and if he concentrated, he could even recall some of the details: mostly loneliness and isolation.

He had to say he liked this better.

*

Constance was proven wrong about Alice two days later, when her phone chimed and an unknown number sent her a quick note.

She ended up agreeing to lunch just to get out of the apartment for a bit. She adored d’Artagnan, she had since she was a teenager, and she was ecstatic that he had reached out when he needed a hand. But as the days stretched on she became more keenly aware that her apartment was rapidly closing in on the two of them. She just needed a little bit of room to breathe.

When Alice suggested a place in the French Quarter, Constance’s inner tourist couldn’t help but get excited. Less than a year into her new life and she hadn’t taken much time to explore the more well-known haunts of New Orleans.

Cheesy as it was, it could be fun.

As she walked up to the café, Constance probably could have picked out which woman was Porthos' friend even if she wasn't waving at her. There was something classic about her looks that softened when she smiled, and Constance's defenses wilted a bit under under how authentically pleased she seemed to meet her.

She also shared Porthos’ easy camaraderie, because the first linked her arm through Constance’s and drew her inside. Constance would be the first to admit that she didn't know a thing about running a café, but she had a professionally critical eye for how to balance the atmosphere at a tourist trap without losing your talent in the kitchen. Just the drink names on the menu made her want to roll her eyes at the blatant marketing ploy, but at least the baked goods sounded intriguing. And surely a baker wouldn't drag her to a place that couldn't make a simple cinnamon roll.

After they bundled their treats over to a tall bistro table, and Constance found it rewarding to see someone else have to hop up into their seat too. She had just sunken her teeth into a raisin cinnamon roll when Alice decided to spring on her:

“So I hear you’re trying to get The Garrison expanded,” Alice spoke with all the casualness of one who paid half-attention to rumors, but her attention was all on Constance. She laid out a few napkins across the table, and upturned the bag of baked goods over it.

Constance bit back her instinctual desire to deny and deflect. Be open, she told herself. Make friends. Gah. She hadn’t had to tell herself to do this since middle school.

“Oh?” She made a show of pretending to be too busy chewing to answer. Not the most polite of responses, but it left the door open. After five years of marriage to Jacques, who could talk the ear off an elephant, she had learned to listen more than she spoke.

Alice had eyes as wide and cat-like as Aramis', and lacked the decency to squint them when she smiled. “Oh. Most people get quiet when they’re tired. Porthos get talkative. And he is three steps away from zombie-levels of exhaustion when I usually see him Monday mornings,” she explained, playfully patting Constance's hand. "So what's the first step?"

Constance snapped her hand back, and took a sip of her coffee to hide her reaction. The bitterness of the coffee grounded her as she psyched herself up: be pleasant, be happy, be social. And there was no use in lying if Alice already knew.

“Maybe. We _might_ expand one day, if the business holds and the customer base stabilizes." Which it would, but Athos would be better off in the long wrong if he capitalized on the hype sooner than that. "If nothing else, the damn fryer needs to go."

"What's wrong with the fryer?" Alice played along, idly tearing apart a pastry. She had bought a half dozen muffins in different flavors, a croissant, and a glazed donut.

"Everything," Constance groused before she could question herself. She was getting tired of having to restock the burn ointment in the first aid kit every month. All three of her chefs had uncountable tiny burns speckling their forearms, and Constance lived in fear of the day their laundry company called to tell her that their chef coats had disintegrated in the washer from all the rips and snags.

"I think it's possessed," Constance decided. Her hands fretting the cinnamon roll into pieces. "It spits worse than that girl in the Exorcist, that's for sure."

A puzzled furrow creased across Alice's brow. “Fryers aren’t suppose to do that."

“Ours does,” Constance bemoaned.

"Then why do you still have it?"

“Because Athos figured he’d never need it when he first started planning his renovations. The kitchen was almost done by the time he figured out the menu. I think they've all just decided to grit their teeth through the burn wounds rather then tell Athos he's being a crotchety old man about it."

Alice's laugh was a high pitched chirp of delight, and Constance couldn't help but smile in reflex even as her mind spiraled down the eddy. Because the fryer was even worse than she made it sound; it really was a safety issue, and Constance wasn't ready to be the restaurant's HR department as well.

Even popping a strip of cinnamon roll in her mouth didn't stop the weight of work from settling on her. How did someone even replace a commercial fryer when they couldn't even find a serial number on it anymore? Athos claimed the previous owner had kept it working for decades, and just looking at the repaired siding she believed it. Was it even electric, or did it run on gas? God forbid it was fueled by propane. She guessed she could start by taking measurements. Some of the newer models were horrifically bigger, but that could be another point for her side in the battle with Athos to expand.

She didn't want to know why she cared so much, invested herself well past what she was being paid, but the principal of it was that it shouldn't have mattered if she did. Athos needed to be the one making some of these decisions himself. Only Constance was half-convinced he had never really recovered from whatever it was that haunted his actions from before The Garrison like a bad penny. She never pushed, because she never wanted to be pushed in return. She'd never be able to face any of them if she had to explain every knock-down drag out argument behind her divorce and flight away from L.A.

It still sat on her though; just like another bad penny, this one sitting on the back of her tongue. It was hidden from sight, but she could taste the bitterness and weight of it every time she swallowed.

Constance watched Alice take a small bite out of a small, golden muffin--cinnamon-honey flavored, smelled delicious. Alice didn't pause, taking a sip from a glass of water, then moving on to another delicate bite of a bright blue muffin.

"I wish you luck pinning him down on a decision," Alice said, jerking forward to catch the third muffin's top as it crumbled when she bit into it. The aroma of apples spilled into the air, and Constance would associate the smell later with Alice continuing to say, "I remember getting my late husband to talk about finances and business plans with me was like talking to a brick wall, once upon a time."

Right. Her husband. Constance felt an unexpected guilt settle oddly in her stomach over the coffee she'd sipped. "Oh, I'm sorry. How long ago did he pass?"

Alice shrugged. When Porthos had mentioned her loss, Constance hadn't been able to put it together with the woman she placed orders with over the phone. Even in person she didn't wear any of the lonely, teary-eyed expressions Constance would expect from a widow; only a settled resignation around her shoulders and a guarded set of eyes above a crumb-stained, smiling mouth. Constance recognized the expression as the same one she saw in the mirror in the morning.

Except she had been the one to leave her husband. Constance wasn't sure it was right to compare their situations, even if Porthos had, so she stayed silent.

Alice wiped her hands and face with a napkin and leaned back.

"A year and a half ago," she explained. Her voice came out as if this conversation had been rehearsed. "Heart attack. I felt horrible that I didn't pestered him about seeing a doctor more often, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Charles was as stubborn as any mule, and just as inclined to listen."

"My ex is remarkably similar," Constance said before her mouth caught up with her brain. She coughed to cover her surprise, and took another sip of coffee, scalding her tongue when she drank it took quick. God, why had she ordered coffee? It was 95 degrees out, she would have been better off with lemonade or water.

Alice didn’t pester her for more information, and Constance planned to return the favor. Only, she could do better than that, couldn't she? That's what they were here to do: talk.

Freedom, rich and heady, flooding Constance, making her feel giddy. She had never acknowledged Jacques so casually before. Even with d’Artagnan he was a source of despair and a reflection of her own mistakes.

"My hu-," Constance caught herself, "My ex-husband. He insisted when we started that he could run it all himself. Promised that after a few years we wouldn't even have to work; we have a manager at each location. He even told me to my face that after the first soft opening I could just stay home, he wouldn't need me on the premises anymore."

Alice scoffed, tearing a grainy muffin in half. "I doubt that. I've heard about you at The Garrison, and the way Porthos tells it, you run that staff like a machine. You're clearly talented—I'd fire my manager in a heartbeat if I thought you'd consider coming on board."

"Awww," Constance smiled. "Thank you."

Alice held up the other half of her muffin. "Would you like a carrot cake bran muffin?"

"Um. No. No, thank you."

"No, of course you wouldn't," Alice agreed. "But having a healthy option that people can identify quickly can set you apart if you can also make it taste really good. And this one tastes as warm and cozy as a sweater. Very tender, excellent use of molasses and cinnamon." She popped the second half in her mouth without offering it out to Constance again.

Constance felt a flood of familiar amusement. “I don’t think I’ve ever met a chef who can’t stop thinking about food.”

Alice smiled. “I never thought of myself as a chef,” she said. “I don’t have any professional training, after all. My husband owned eight bakeries around town by the time he died, but he wasn’t a chef either. He was just a very smart investor. He was very focused in building his foundation. I didn’t think I could continue walking in his footsteps so I started selling the locations off.”

Alice hadn't touched her coffee since she sat down. Now, with two muffins left, she kept her hands busy by stirring in a container of creamer into her mug. She didn’t add in any sugar, which made Constance cringe. Her own coffee habits were self-inflicted and black, a hard-born necessity at her old restaurant where there was barely time to breath, later alone doctor a cup of coffee, but she hated the way it tasted bitter and gut-punching without a hint of sweetness.

Alice slipped the coffee spoon into her mouth and smiled at Constance around it as if sharing a secret.

“I think I only kept the Last Candle because it was Charles’ first bakery. I couldn’t bring myself to sell it off. I thought I would hold out for the right offer. Only it never came, and I spent more and more time in there each day. Eventually I picked up a thing or ten.”

She used her now clean spoon to go fishing in her water glass, pulling out ice cubes to dump into her coffee.

“They always make their coffee too hot here,” she explained with a rueful look. “I think their machine is broken. I don’t mention it though—I want to see how long it take them to fix it themselves.”

“I'll be sure to keep it a secret. So you never trained to run a bakery?”

“Oh Lord, no,” Alice confirmed. “Crack open a copy of _The Southern Belle’s Handbook_ and you have my childhood in a nutshell. I was suppose to marry rich, never work a day in my life, and maintain a diet of clear alcohol and ice cubes. I was lucky to find both love and comfort with Charles, but then he passed and,” she shrugged philosophically. “Mid-life crises come in all shapes, I guess.”

Constance cracked a smile.

“I envy you. I didn't even try to fight to keep the restaurant in my divorce," she admitted. Part of her felt horrified at simply unloading this upon Alice, who was little more than a stranger. It didn't completely overtake the relief of _finally_ admitting it out loud, though. "It was in both of our names, but after everything that happened I just gave it up for a payout and ran."

For a moment Alice said nothing, and Constance felt a wave of embarrassment over being the type of person who overshared at the first meeting. Then:

“Did hindsight give you desire to fight for it?” Alice asked. She didn’t look piteous, thank God. Constance could see why Porthos liked her.

“I don’t think so,” she answered. “I probably could have wrestled something out of his hands, but controlling interest would have stayed with him. Everyone worth knowing in the industry knew about the divorce. It was easier to leave."

She remembered reaching back out to d’Artagnan in the final months of her marriage, grasping at straws, really. All their peers in L.A. acted like it was Constance’s fault for derailing Jacques’ dreams. She had just wanted someone on her side.

"I still checked in on the place sometimes," she admitted, a flush slipping across her cheeks. Late at night when she had put a large enough dent in her wine collection and she was feeling self-deprecating. "It really is quite satisfying, watching the ratings and reviews spiral down since I left."

Alice didn't laugh or wave her off, even though Constance had meant it sort of as a joke. Instead, the other woman reached across the table and covered Constance's hand, giving it a supportive squeeze and withdrawing before Constance could beat her to it. And Constance didn't even want her to pull away that time.

She tried to be quiet as she drew a deep breath into her lungs and exhaled. For the first time in months, it felt like she was finally making some progress.

“They have an orange raspberry muffin that I think I want to steal off their menu,” Alice announced, unaware of momentous accomplishment. “It's a great flavor profile for spring. Here, try it."

She held the fifth muffin out to Constance, who accepted it with a happy bite. A zing of citrus popped in her mouth as her teeth sank into the top, which wasn't as crumbly as the apple one but felt delightful to bite into.

While Constance admired the fresh tang of raspberries, all beautifully suspended and plentiful through the muffin, Alice unwrapped the paper from the last one, which had a bright green jalapeño perched on top like a hat. It was the only savory one of the lot, and the wafting smell of crispy cheddar cheese on top was impossible to ignore.

Alice crafted her bite to include part of the pepper on top. Then her eyes popped open and she said, "Bacon."

"What?" Constance asked.

"It tastes like bacon. That's the damn secret. I've had customers coming in—shit." Alice cut herself off and started balling up her napkins, while Constance wondered what she had missed.

"Do you need to leave?"

"Sort of," Alice replied, not unkindly. "Sorry to rush out. I may have much more than just a competent muffin on my hands, but I think I have a plan. Much like you have a plan, right?"

"Maybe," Constance admitted.

Alice hopped down from her seat. She circled around the table and grabbed Constance by the hands.

“Taking care of yourself sounds reasonable to me,” Alice said. “I like to think I would’ve done the same thing if Charles hadn’t suited me. If you need anything, just let me know, okay?" She squeezed her hands. "It was lovely to finally get to know you."

Constance was sure her smile wobbled on her lips, but she managed to fish out a, "You too."

Alice looked pleased with herself as she strolled out of the cafe, her cellphone in one hand and her under-sweetened coffee in the other. Constance’s own coffee was finally cool enough to drink without risk of injury, and she knocked it back like it was a shot of whiskey.

A few hours later, she received a text with a happy face and a request to meet back up for lunch the following week.

She'd have to thank Porthos later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, I love Alice. 
> 
> So a lot of the recipes we are utilizing in this fic are coming from three places:  
> [Saveur](http://www.saveur.com/recipes-search)  
> [foodffs](http://foodffs.tumblr.com/)  
> And readwing's head. A lot of what the guys end up eating in scenes is what we had for dinner the night before. 
> 
> Here are some of the highlights:
> 
> [Catfish or Oyster](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/crabby-jack-oyster-poboy) [Po'boys](http://www.saveur.com/creole-remoulade-recipe)  
> [Jambalaya](http://foodffs.tumblr.com/post/137254917078/jambalaya-really-nice-recipes-every-hour-show-me)  
> [Aramis' Seduction Shrimp](http://foodffs.tumblr.com/post/146648174758/honey-lime-shrimp-kabobs-4-ingredient-marinade)  
> [French Onion Soup](http://www.saveur.com/michel-roux-french-onion-soup-recipe)  
> [Mahimahi and Scallop à la Nage](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Salmon-Scallops-Nage)  
> [Coq Au Vin](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Classic-Coq-au-Vin)  
> [Cromquembouche](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Croquembouche)  
> [Blackberry and Lemon Brown Sugar Tart](http://www.saveur.com/article/recipes/brown-butter-tart-with-blackberries)  
> [Brioche Perdu](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Brioche-Perdu) [with Lavender Honey Ice Cream](http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Lavender-Honey-Ice-Cream)  
> [Mushroom Risotto](http://www.saveur.com/article/recipes/mushroom-risotto)  
> [Basque Seafood Stew](http://www.saveur.com/basque-seafood-stew-recipe)  
> [Crab Cakes](http://foodffs.tumblr.com/post/145507207878/dungeness-crab-cakes-really-nice-recipes-every)  
> [Orange or Lemon Mousse](http://foodffs.tumblr.com/post/146065536116/creamy-orange-mousse-really-nice-recipes-every)
> 
> [And we're just dying to use this one somewhere](http://www.saveur.com/article/recipes/magret-a-la-dartagnan)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Porthos needs sleep.  
> Constance is a stressed-out ball of fluff.  
> The puppy jumps in paws first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lavish love on this- readwing really picked up the slack on this chapter while chapstickaddict lost her mind

Porthos woke up with a hoary blindness behind his eyes and a stale taste in his mouth. He stood by the idea that waking up was the worst part of his day, if only because he always took far too long to get his brain to think coherently. His dreams clung to him like spiderwebs, and he knew he'd forgotten something…something big. 

Someone was hovering over him, muttering. Porthos couldn’t make out the words. Blinking to clear his vision, he squinted up into the morning light. Aramis stood over him, already wide awake and effortlessly stunning, and Porthos couldn't decide if he wanted to slap him away or drag him closer. A slender finger poked his shoulder and Porthos settled on retreat, burrowing deeper into the covers. 

“‘lfante.” 

“What?” 

“Elephant,” he forced out past his uncooperative tongue. "Do we need to take an elephant into work today?” he asked. Aramis cocked an eyebrow. 

“We really need to get you coffee.” 

“A two to four hundred pound elephant,” Porthos reiterated. He was certain that was on his list for the morning. It needed to come with them. He didn't know how they were going to carry it down the street, but it was vitally important to get it to the restaurant.

“Elephants weigh more than that.” 

“I know what I’m about,” Porthos grumbled. God, waking up sucked. 

Aramis poked him again. Porthos broke down and heaved himself up. He felt grimy and empty; he had been wishing for a decent night’s sleep to recharge him, but the night had passed in a blink and if anything he was more dog-tired than when he'd hit the sack earlier that morning.

“I’m up, I’m up,” he growled when Aramis rocked him by his shoulder. "Where's Athos?"

Without turning around, he could feel Aramis wince behind him.

"Athos went in early to be nice to the staff," Aramis said. “Odds are he’s gonna turn into a meat grinder this afternoon."

"Shit. The interviews," Porthos burst up from the bed so quick he almost headbutted Aramis, only to kick him instead as he moved to swing his legs off the bed. His limbs were sluggish and uncoordinated as he tumbled to sit at the edge of the bed, but adrenaline shot up his skull and boosted him past it. "I completely forgot we was interviewing for chefs today."

"He started the countdown yesterday after he saw a stand selling beads at the market," Aramis informed him. "Get ready for more drunk tourists than usual and the odd request for king cakes, babe; Mardi Gras is officially around the corner."

Porthos rubbed the heels of his palms against his eyes and groaned. Aramis tsk-ed at him, and a pair of arms wrapped around his waist from behind. Porthos covered his hands with his own and pulled them tighter around until he was incased an Aramis-squid blanket.

Aramis nuzzled his whole face into the crook of Porthos' neck, inhaling deeply. Then he bit him. Hard.

"Fuckin' vampire!” Porthos snarled, jerking back but not managing to dislodge Aramis. He was definitely awake now. 

Aramis kissed the mark in apology. His arms squeezed tight before pulling away, settling his hands on Porthos' shoulders. "Athos told me to get you up at a decent hour. He's on edge and he wants us there, even if he won't admit it. Are you okay?"

His eyes weren’t quite cooperating with him yet, but they at least let him give Aramis a bleary look. "What do you mean?"

"You look like shit," Aramis told him, matter as fact.

"I feel like shit," Porthos agreed. "But I'm alright. Come on, let's go save Athos—hhnng!"

The knuckles of Aramis' hands dug deep into the center of his back, sparks of pleasure dancing across his overtaxed muscles. Porthos leaned back into his grip and was rewarded with strong thumbs kneading up his shoulder blades. In no time at all, Aramis had him bent forward, head hung so low between his knees that Porthos was afraid he'd fall back asleep and start drooling on the bedroom floor.

"Mmmm," Porthos criticized. "Th' feels nice, but we're gonna be late."

Aramis' body weight settled over his shoulders, supremely confident Porthos could hold him up even half-asleep. He murmered into Porthos's back, "Athos will understand. Let's take a moment to take care of you first. Tell me what you need."

With Aramis plastered against him and purring in his ear, tempting him into hedonism, it was a testament to his body's weariness that Porthos could only feel the faintest stirring of heat at his offer. And even that was overshadowed by the fact that he knew he looked a right mess when he woke up in the morning, sweaty and gross from the day before and face mushed with sleep.

"I need a shower," he finally settled on for his answer, barely holding on to his sanity past the mercy of Aramis' attentions.

Aramis snuffed out a laugh against his back. "Or I can follow you into the shower and you can let me play with your hair."

Porthos groaned against those magic hands, his bone-weary lethargy sinking into a distant rumble.

"Yes, please."

As Aramis herded him toward the shower, hands teasing and snapping at the waistband of Porthos' boxers, Porthos still felt worn thin but happiness lingered under it. He had the best people in the world at his side, and any struggle had to be worth taking care of them. So what if Mardi Gras loomed up the street, threatening to pick a fight? They could take it.

Then Aramis said, almost too quickly for Porthos to catch: "By the way, prepare yourself. We've got duck on the menu today."

Porthos' mood bubble popped around him as abrupt as a small child bursting into tears. “Duck?” he couldn’t help but whine.

*

"Duck?" d'Artagnan asked as he came in with Constance on Tuesday morning to Athos carefully writing out the specials board. An unfamiliar man in a dress shirt pushed past them and out the door. Constance rolled her eyes, her lips tightened unhappily.

D'Artagnan wasn't going to touch that with a ten-foot pole. Maybe in private once the vein in Constance’s forehead stopped pulsing, but he had carefully managed not to get between Athos and Constance at work yet. He didn't plan on starting today.

"I didn't know we served duck," he said to Athos, coming to stand by him while Constance set her clipboard down at the host station and disappeared into the back office. If he noticed the sound of rattling drawers and cabinets being slammed emanating from the back, Athos didn't show it.

Their head chef was writing with a single-minded intensity, referring back to a hastily scrawled note every few lines, and steadily ignored him. If only he knew that simply encouraged d’Artagnan. Leaning over his shoulder, d’Artagnan felt his eyebrows raise as he read. 

“Duck a l'orange,” he asked incredulously. "Seriously?"

Athos, to d’Artagnan's shock, turned a bit red around the ears. "It's a classic."

"I've never seen it in a restaurant. Ever."

"It's an old-fashioned classic," Athos defended. D'Artagnan was frankly amazed at how flustered he appeared; he didn’t think anything so unadorned as duck could rattle the man.

He clapped Athos on the shoulder, "I'm sure it'll be great."

Athos frowned, snapping out of his weird funk to shoot an offended look at d'Artagnan. "Of course it'll be. We've cut back on the sugar and added more herbs and aromatic vegetables. We're using the Cointreau for deglazing. Peychaud bitters in the orange juice gastrique."

"I don't know what most of that is, but now I'm hungry," d'Artagnan complained. Damn, but all it took was Athos talking about cooking techniques and his stomach promptly forgot about the lovely breakfast d’Artagnan had prepared this morning. He'd been proud of it too--just some easy apple raisin oatmeal recipe that Porthos had gleefully plied him with when d'Artagnan made the mistake of opening a conversation with "I like apples". Now he had a stack of apple-related recipes he felt obligated to go through between meeting Constance's demands for any and all things requiring marinara.

Just in case he ever deluded himself into thinking he was some sort of master chef, work could promptly disabuse him of the notion. Watching Athos write up the specials board brought down the shrouded awareness of inexperience and the hungry pining of knowing d'Artagnan couldn't compete with the ingredients in Constance's fridge. The fragrance of warm orange and thyme already drifted towards the dining room, and underneath it was the recognizable aroma of a fresh pot of stock set to simmer. His mouth watered at the thought.

To distract himself into remembering he was supposed to _sell_ the food, not _eat_ the food, he considered a new approach for pitching the dish in the dining room.

"So classic French duck for lunch--What brought that on? Or is that on the regular rotation of specials?"

“It's definitely not a regular,” Athos huffed, capping off the pen. “Porthos isn’t comfortable cooking it and Aramis doesn’t like cooking it, and it can clash with the menu. But first rule of every seafood restaurant: there’s always a chicken-eater. Every once in a while I delude myself into thinking I can make people try new things. Besides,” Athos' black mood hovered back down onto his shoulders. "I'll need all the incentive I can get to make it through today."

Whatever racket Constance had started in the back room had gone quiet, but the underlying tension had returned to the room. D'Artagnan looked at the closed door down the hall, back at Athos, and decided to hell with it. Better than wading through this for the rest of the day. 

"Who was that guy that was here?"

"A failed job interviewee."

Ah. 

Athos on a good day was intense in a way that drew the eye, and he exuded charisma so naturally no one noticed until they were neck-deep swimming in it and bedecked in an apron without remembering how or why. That was the man who'd presumably asked d'Artagnan back in to work, although he hadn't used the words 'work' or 'you're hired' and he'd had Constance do it instead. But the man who rounded on d'Artagnan, pen in hand like a knife, was all of that with the volume cranked so high it came off as white, terrifying noise.

It occurred to d'Artagnan then that he had met Athos the Chef, but he had never met Athos the Boss.

"Do yourself a favor," Athos said, his words clipped and and full of rage like dropping stones. "When you show up at an interview, show up on time. Show up early, even! But do not show up, hours before the schedule interview time, and try to improve your chances by flirting with the staff."

D'Artagnan blinked. "You're kidding."

"If only."

“Who--Why would someone do that?" Aside from maybe Aramis, his mind supplied. At least he was charming enough to make it seem coincidental. D’Artagnan’s last job had essentially been one huge health code violation waiting to spill over, but the biggest trial for getting people hired there had been getting anyone to show up and apply.

"Oh, we get all kinds. The nicer the restaurant, the more people feel entitled to get away with. They assume as long as they can give you the right answer, you'll never question their intentions. Do you want to know what the most important thing is about working in a kitchen?"

“Uh,” d’Artagnan floundered in the face of being suddenly put on the spot. "Avoid cross-contamination?"

“Teamwork,” Athos groused, slamming the cap of his pen against the heel of his hand in an action that did nothing to ease d’Artagnan’s concern for his growing agitation. 

D'Artagnan had never be so thankful to get out of interviewing for a position in his life. 

"I've worked with a lot of difficult personalities, but that's the key. Having trust and respect for the people you work with. Aramis might flirt like he breathes,” —Oh good, Athos thought so too— "But he knows his limits, and he tells you what he's capable of upfront."

He couldn't resist asking, "Did Aramis tell you in his interview that he might accidentally throw a knife into the ceiling one day?” That had been an interesting clean-up. 

“Accidentally," Athos scoffed. “Aramis doesn’t miss.” His attention was drifting miles away, gazing over d'Artagnan's shoulders and out the windows behind him. "You wouldn't happen to know any chefs around your age looking for a learning opportunity would you?"

D'Artagnan thought he was kidding for a moment, but Athos looked at him expectantly. 

"Uh, no. I'm not from around here."

Athos stared at him blankly.

"I'm from Florida?" he reminded him.

"Oh," Athos said. "Well, damn."

There was a knock on the glass door, and a small woman with bountiful, dark hair waved at them from the other side of the door, pointing at the handle Constance must have locked behind him.

Athos looked dead inside as he muttered, "We have more interviews coming."

Down the hallway the door clicked open, and Constance emerged looking more cool and collected than she had when she'd gone in. She had stacks of papers in her arms, some of which looked to be on nice, creamy parchment, and d'Artagnan's brain clued in that those must be the resumes for the other interviews.

“I’ve never had duck before,” d’Artagnan told Athos, eager to change the subject. “Do we get to taste it before service?” 

Athos said nothing, but shot him a look that spoke volumes. Specifically: “No, idiot, I’m planning to throw you the wolves with nothing.” 

D’Artagnan decided to retreat into the corner and keep himself occupied by folding napkins. It seemed safer than being in the war zone that the bar area was becoming. 

The next applicant did a bit better, but even across the room d’Artagnan could tell her answers annoyed Athos, and Athos’ annoyance sparked Constance’s contrary streak. He was glad he was across the room, and deeply hoped she was the last candidate of the day. 

The poor girl left, flashes of outrage peeking out under her stone-set face. D’Artagnan figured that trait alone put her in the lead for the job, but as she stomped away thought she probably wouldn't return their calls. 

“I’m going back to the kitchen,” Athos announced to the world in general, though the effect was ruined when he shot a displeased expression at Constance, leaving no confusion over who he was addressing. Constance’s face went still, her eyes frozen and her nostrils flared. Seeing the warning signals firing a mile off, d’Artagnan scrambled to throw himself in as a buffer. 

“Does this mean I get duck?” he asked, willing to ride this out until at least dinner service.

Athos growled—actually growled—as he passed by d’Artagnan and stormed into the kitchen. Constance returned to the room down the hall.

Standing alone in the dining room, D'Artagnan had to fight back the giddy laugh bubbling up. Maybe he should be concerned with all the tempers flying around. Hell, maybe he should chase the angry lady they'd interviewed down the street, and tell her she'd fit in perfectly. D'Artagnan certainly did, because even in the midst of playing go-between he was pretty excited to see how the day would turn out.

He was used to Constance's fire, but it was no wonder why Aramis worked so hard to push Athos' buttons. The high of Athos angry was a great one to ride.

His good mood lasted until he scanned down the list of names on the waiter’s whiteboard:

**Lucy**  
**Emilie**  
**Jacques**  
**Samara**  
**d’Ar-tan-yung**

D’Artagnan glared at the board, or more specifically the edited, botched version of his name on the board. Picking up the pen stuck to the edge of the board with string and a liberal amount of worn duct tape, he smudged out the dry ink of his name and paused as the felt tip hovered over the empty space. 

How best to respond? Because d’Artagnan had no illusions, this was a battle. 

Aramis had taken to butchering d’Artagnan’s name every time he called across the kitchen. As much as he fought down the hounding desire to push back against the teasing (this was Constance’s place of work; he wanted to keep good relationships with everyone; it was unprofessional in a place that screamed elite down to the carpet fibers) Aramis’ cocky smile danced in his mind, screaming provocation and challenge.

This is how he winds Athos up, he though practically to himself.

But he couldn’t just walk away from that. 

He was stuck in contemplation when he heard someone snickering behind him. D'Artagnan turned in time to see Lucy and Samara ducking around the corner. Suspicion stirred within him—they had already seen the board, hadn't they?

Aramis wouldn't be put off if he changed his name back. He'd probably take it as an opportunity to preen in d'Artagnan's face if he did. He could practically feel the chef's arm draped around his neck already, and the teasing, _"You're too fun to play with, mon chou."_

Fuck that. He picked up the pen and rewrote his name—and his answer. 

**Lucy**  
**Emilie**  
**Jacques**  
**Samara**  
**d’Artag-nope**

Sticking the cap onto the pen with a definitive smack, d’Artagnan headed into the kitchen to find Athos, and Athos' incentivizing duck.

*

An opportunity to pitch the special came twenty minutes into his shift with an older couple seated near the front window. They came in because she wanted seafood, and he was grumbling about the lack of options. Clearly the whole city had woken up on the wrong side of the bed. Normally, d’Artagnan would have pointed him toward the coq au vin, but as of this morning he was on a mission. 

“And our specials today include the duck a l'orange,” D’Artagnan tried to breathe out the name of the dish with the same easiness Aramis used when he got in that morning. His name was one thing, but there'd be hell to pay if he mispronounced the special. “Which is served with a lightened orange gastrique and herb-roasted root vegetables. Highly recommended. I tried some before service—it'll make you feel like you're sitting in the shade of an orange grove while roasting a chicken.” 

“I don’t think I’ve ever had duck,” the gentleman muttered, but he turned his head from the menu. The irate hostility dimmed from his face under d'Artagnan's earnest spiel.

“You did,” his wife corrected. “That Thai restaurant.” 

“Ohh. Did I like it?"

“Far as I can recall. Can we also add an order of the scallops and steamed brussel sprouts for the appetizer?” she requested. D’Artagnan dutifully made a note of her order while her husband grumbled about 'more seafood'.

"We're in New Orleans, dear. You should at least try to enjoy it."

"I don't like brussel sprouts either."

"They're good for your heart, Harold."

Harold turned back to d'Aragnan “Yeah, why not. The duck thing sounds good at least.” He handed back his menu. D’Artagnan mentally cheered.

He grinned wide at Athos’ double-take when the order came in. 

“Told you I could do it.” 

“It wasn’t a challenge.” 

“Yes, it was." 

Porthos looked up from his whisking, "Wait, did someone order the duck?"

"Yes they did," d'Artagnan tossed over his shoulder as he headed for his next table.

Aramis called after him, "You're getting a bit uppity, aren't you?"

"Harold is counting on you!” d'Artagnan shouted back.

His next opportunity came with a family seated in the corner. The little girl, fully decked out in light up sneakers, green and black stripped tights, a golden tutu with a leafy crown atop her head, picked through the menu, clearly unhappy with the selections offered to her. His heart went out to her. While the restaurant had plenty to offer on the line of homestyle southern cuisine, they were just on the line of being too polished for many parents to bring their kids in. As such, their version of a kids menu seemed to be the waiters tipping off the kitchen to cut back on the spice when they put their orders in, because who wanted a crying kid with their mouth on fire? Porthos usually took it one step further, arranging hushpuppies into smiley faces and drawing daisies with tartar sauce onto the crab cakes.

While the little girl's parents debated the appetizers she stared up at him with narrowed, unsure, and suspicious eyes. D’Artagnan crouched down until he was on her level, smiling. 

“Not sure what you want?” 

She shook her head, her mouth twisted up. "I wanted the mac-in-cheese, but it's got fish stuff in it."

D'Artagnan had to bite his lip as he nodded solemnly at her. He himself had hated lobster until well into his late teens. 

"My momma's gonna let me eat around the fish stuff on hers but she says I gotta order something else."

“Bummer,” he commiserated, before making a show of brightening up. "That's alright, we'll find you something fancier than mac n' cheese. Do you like chicken?” Another nod. Awesome. 

“You like oranges?” Three in a row. 

“I’ve got a really nice duck that tastes a lot like oranges and crunchy stuff.” 

“Ducks? Like in the lake?” 

“Yep.” 

She turned accusingly to her parents. “Why haven’t we ever had duck?” They both blinked at her in surprise. 

“I don’t know, dear. Do you want to try some?” 

“Yes!” the precocious little princess announced.

Her parents, thrilled she was willing to try something new, approved the choice. Though her mom's face fell when she announced that her mom could eat her side of vegetables while she ate her mom's mac-in-cheese. D'Artagnan figured the little bargainer would go places when she grew up.

Athos just stared at him when he slid the order in. 

D'Artagnan got three more orders within the hour out on the floor. After that, all it took was word of mouth and people being nosy about what their neighbors ordered. Even Lucy and Emilie were turning in tickets for the duck by the time Harold ordered dessert.

Walking in to the kitchen with a spring in his step and a ticket for orange mousse, d'Artagnan was confused to find the chefs had cut off the music. The scrape and sizzle of pots and pans echoed loudly. Porthos garnished a sugar tart back at the dessert station. Aramis moved quickly to flip a pan of fillets while his other hand whisked away at a pot.

Athos stood further down the line, standing at the shoulder of someone with a very expensive-looking shirt, sleeves rolled up and an apron thrown over top.

Another interviewee. That seemed excessive, bringing in three people in one day.

D'Artagnan turned to Aramis, who looked up at him with an unfamiliar line between his brows and a grimace at the corners of his lips.

"Working interview," said Aramis, his voice pitched low enough that d'Artagnan had to circle around the counter to hear him. "Was professional enough at the start, if a little nervous. Athos was pretty patient though; I think he feels bad about scaring away the two from this morning. Porthos and I didn't even get to meet them. But then this one burned the roux for the jambalaya."

D'Artagnan winced. They went through jambalaya fast, and Athos did not like to fall behind on their schedule for making a fresh batch. He looked down at where Athos, more grim-faced than he'd been this morning, was dipping a tasting spoon into a thick white sauce. Nodding, he muttered something to the interviewee, who grabbed more pepper and sprinkled it into the pan.

"But is it going okay?" d'Artagnan almost didn't want to ask. "I mean, he's still here, so that's saying something. Right?"

"Maybe," Aramis said absently, more focused on mixing what d'Artagnan could see now was some sort of sauce. It smelled like the duck, savory and citrus with a hint of coriander, and d'Artagnan couldn't help but lean over the pot to see what it looked like before it was plated.

Aramis sighed, sounding like a world-weary mother. "At least you've learned to put your hair up, pup. Grab that pot by your elbow and pour it in, would you?"

The liquid in the pot in question was an unmistakable golden orange. D'Artagnan held it up to his face and inhaled deeply; he may have moaned a bit.

There was a loud snort from behind them from Porthos, and Aramis chuckled, "Add it in, d'Artagnan."

"I am," he protested. He didn't draw attention to the fact that Aramis had decided not to butcher his name that time. Good habits needed to be encouraged. Aramis stirred while d'Artagnan angled the pot to allow the orange syrup to drizzle in. Then the chef leaned and smelled it too, the hypocrite. 

"Mmmm," Aramis hummed in appreciation. "Perfecto. Almost makes it worth dealing with the duck. Now, grab a good-sized pinch of that zest on your left and add it in."

D'Artagnan did as asked. Then, wiping off his hands, "What's wrong with the duck?"

"Nothing's wrong with the duck," Aramis raised an eyebrow at him. "It's one of _Athos'_ recipes; it's perfect. What makes you think there's something wrong with it? Wait! I caught myself—we're using thyme leaves instead of ground thyme."

"I only said that one time," d'Artagnan protested, only to be cut off by Porthos joining them.

"Well I don't like it 'cause it looks like chicken but it don't taste like it," the big chef chimed in as he came to stand behind d'Artagnan, who could feel him like a furnace through his uniform. "Did you forget something?"

D'Artagnan blinked. "Did I?"

Porthos rubbed at his face, surprisingly tired-looking for how early it was, and asked, "Ticket?"

"Shit!" d'Artagnan cursed, dropping the pot back to the stove with a clatter. Athos and his interview shot their heads around to look at him. Heat crawled up his face as he fumbled for Harold's ticket. "Shit. Yeah, orange mousse. I gotta—I gotta get back out there now, shit."

D'Artagnan scurried back into the waiting room, hoping like hell he'd still get his tip. 

If he had been even a year younger, he may have considered showing off by trying to memorize the long line of orders he faced every night; it was a fun parlor trick and earned him a wealth of tips if he successfully pulled it off. However, if he mixed up orders, or forgot something, he could just imagine the resulting chaos and catastrophe. His tips would suffer, and Constance would skin him alive. 

After Athos, that is. D’Artagnan was sure the chef would have a conniption if he didn’t turn a ticket in for a table. Their finely tuned system was like one of those cyclotrons he read about, where one little grain of sand could send the whole thing off-kilter. D’Artagnan had the suspicion Athos constantly thought he’d be that damn sandy grain. 

He still managed to push the duck another dozen times through the night. He would have been ecstatic, but his feet hurt and his head was pounding. The line had been nearly out the door all night; he had ended up working through both his breaks, and his lunch had been nothing more than a quick stop out back, half a po-boy he split with Constance, and chugging down a bottle of water Porthos had thrown at him. 

After service, he planned to help bus the remaining tables, but Lucy shoo’ed him away.

“Go take a cool down lap or something,” she ordered with a flick of her fingers. “You look horrible."

“I do not!” d’Artagnan protested. As he said it though, a spike of pain and irritation ran ragged through his skull. Damnit. He had been wrangling back the headache that had been edging around the corners of his brain for the last four hours, but a moment’s peace brought it crashing down. 

Lucy didn’t reply; she simply grabbed his shirt by the shoulder and sent him on his way with a shove and a look that said she wasn't in the mood to herd him. He welcomed the excuse to get some air.

As he headed toward the kitchen, he gave a friendly nod to Athos, who was already up at the hostess station with Constance. He didn't seem angry anymore, but his face was somehow more grizzled and grumpy than it'd been that morning. D'Artagnan mouthed a quick 'good luck!' at Constance and double-timed it away from her scowl as he retreated from the front of house. 

He was cutting through the kitchen to get to the back alley when Aramis and Porthos' voices drew him in. They were elbows deep into scrubbing down the kitchen, and in the middle of an argument about...lobster mac-n-cheese?

“It’s cruel,” Porthos was defending when d’Artagnan wandered by.

“I’ll play them an appropriately mournful aria the next time I start boiling water,” Aramis replied with a pandering tone. 

D’Artagnan slowed down despite himself. He knew it wasn’t his place to shoe-horn in a conversation with the chefs during their spin-down time, but he couldn't help hovering. If he let himself, he'd become a fly stuck to their walls one of these days. They were just such fascinating people.

The food was also just too good, here. The po-boy for lunch had been tasty, but now was his chance to hone in on any leftover duck.

Sadly, it wasn't duck he found, but shrimp. More accurately, scraps of shrimp shells, which Porthos, shucked from his chef’s coat and arms bare under a tanktop, was throwing across the room at Aramis, who did his best to fend him off with a pot lid while laughing. 

“Awww, are you emotionally compromised?” Aramis asked in an overly sweet tone. He had to deflect another tail aimed for his forehead. It bounced off the glass lid toward d’Artagnan, who quickly dodged out of the way. 

“Hey, kiddo,” Porthos greeted, barely breaking stride in his shrimp catapulting. “Come to watch Aramis get punched in the face?” 

“Bring it!” 

“What are we arguing about?” d’Artagnan made the mistake of asking. 

And that was how d’Artagnan discovered that the reason the restaurant didn’t have a lobster display tank was Porthos. 

“He names them,” Aramis gleefully gushed behind his makeshift shield. “Every damn time. Then he gets mopey when the lobsters go into the water, and it's hilarious. I get to chase him around the kitchen while Athos makes fun of my Godfather impression."

“It’s sad!” Porthos protested as he snagged d’Artagnan’s water bottle from him. D’Artagnan figured he wanted it for himself, but instead Porthos cracked the top open and refilled it, shoving it back into d’Artagnan’s hands with a stern look. 

“Tender-heart!” Aramis hollered back. 

“Am not! d’Artagnan, back me up here. There’s gotta be a little bit of ceremony, at least.” 

“I’d kill them,” d’Artagnan offered instantly. Porthos glared, and to soften the blow d'Artagnan chugged down two big gulps of water.

“Seriously?!”

“I don’t think you understand, Porthos,” he said, batting his eyes too-innocently in a way he was sure would get him caught, but Porthos seemed to be buying it. "I killed Bambi once during hunting season. Not Bambi’s mom, but Bambi.” Fawns were off limits for even the most stringent of hunting permits. However, d’Artagnan figured Porthos, city boy that he was, wouldn’t know the first thing about hunting.

“…You horrific human being,” Porthos accused with a dead-eyed stare while from behind him Aramis looked on in poorly disguised amusement. “You look all innocent and adorable, but it just hides a heart of darkness.” 

“Aramis is right,” d’Artagnan replied. “You’re a tender-heart.” 

That earned him a light _whap_ to the back of his skull that he was too slow to dodge. Before D’Artagnan could consider retaliation, Athos stuck his head back into the kitchen. 

“Aramis,” he called to the grinning chef elbows deep in suds and the stove top. “Constance suggests you _please_ fix your phone, and I have to say I agree.” 

Aramis made a pathetic noise, but Athos raised a hand to stall his complaints. 

“Before you argue, consider this: if you don’t change it yourself, I’ll just wait until later tonight and do it myself." 

D'Artagnan thought of the white board and snorted. “That won't slow him down much."

Athos jolted, perhaps only just realizing d’Artagnan was there. In turn d'Artagnan, realizing that he'd drawn his boss's scrutiny onto himself, straightened himself from where he'd started to lean against the counter. He ended up on the receiving end of a look that was equal parts amused, resigned, tired, and startled. Not wanting to invite a repeat of that morning, D’Artagnan just smiled and waved back at him.

“Hi there.” 

“What are you doing back here?” Athos asked. 

Porthos tossed him a rag while he stalled on thinking up an appropriate way to phrase Lucy’s dismissal of his help.

“He's helping, since Aramis is being next to useless.” 

“Hey now,” Aramis protested. “I’ll have you know I’m great for morale.” 

Athos rolled his eyes and disappeared without rising to Aramis’ bait. With nothing better than a rag in hand by way of convenient excuses, d’Artagnan figured he'd help out anyway, and set about cleaning. 

Porthos demonstrated to him how to scrub down the fancier equipment on the counters and the industrial stove tops while Aramis bagged the three trashcans. He hauled them out the back and down the alley to the dumpster while Porthos started in on the ovens around his work station. 

“So what was wrong with Aramis’ phone?” d’Artagnan asked while he scrubbed at a particularly difficult grease stain--which was all of them.

"Heh. Ain't nothing wrong with it, really. He just set his phone to auto-correct the word 'duck' a few years ago," Porthos explained, giving the oven's open door a baleful look. "On account of it kept messing up his texts."

"What was it auto-correcting?"

"'Fuck'," Porthos grinned. "He felt it was hindering his means of expression, like he don't have enough of those. And then Athos actually put duck on the menu, and Aramis had to try to explain what he meant in more than a few unintentional texts to quite a lot of disappointed staff members. And suppliers. And our fish guy."

"Mr. Wu loves me," Aramis cut in, his grin damn near sinful.

When Athos returned, they had the kitchen wiped down and sparkling. The awe-inspiring equipment had loosened its grip on d'Artagnan, and he had to admit the most appealing part now was just how lived-in the space felt. He knew the restaurant hadn't been in business long, but there were already light scratches across the counters and storage, and the burners on the stove top had that shimmer of grease that soap and water couldn't fully erode. No one would ever accuse Athos of not running a tight ship, and it showed in the thoughtful use and care of his kitchen.

Then there was the fryer.

From the way Athos was rubbing his thumbs against his eyes, it didn't look like his rundown with Constance had gone pleasantly. Porthos, washing his hands at the sink, had a few bottles of beer waiting at his elbow, and with wet hands he turned to crack one open. He held one up as a lure to reel Athos to his side.

D'Artagnan wasn't sure if he should bring it up, but, "Do you know your fryer is broken?"

The way Athos puffed up at his remark would have been funny had his glare landed on anyone but him. Exhaustion in every syllable, he asked, "Did Constance put you up to this?"

"Oh, come on," Aramis sidled by in the middle of unbuttoning his chef coat and stopped to rest a pacifist's hand on Athos' shoulder. "It's after service. Time to unplug and unwind. We can debate later the merits of waiters who missed their calling as food critics, and have more opinions than tables to wait on."

It was easier to focus on Aramis' prattle than watch Athos pretend he wasn't leaning on Porthos. So d'Artagnan took a hip against the counter and, with more energy than he felt this late, retorted. "Hey! I think I did alright tonight."

"Uh-huh," Aramis patronized, though his eyes were lit with good humor. His coat swished behind his shoulder like a cat's tail as he moved to update the staff board.

"You did great," Athos complimented. "Almost hard to believe, but we used up our whole inventory of duck."

"Thank fuck," Porthos added with a grin. "We should celebrate."

“D'Arty!" Aramis yelled out across the kitchen.

"Not my name!"

“Yeah, I think the board agrees with you!” 

D’Artagnan’s eyes narrowed down, and he skidded out of the kitchen towards the wait staff board. A new hundred dollar bill was held tauntingly high in the left corner by a cheerful strawberry shaped magnet. He didn’t pay attention to it though, more considered with the list down the left side of the board’s grid:

**Lucy**  
**Emilie**  
**Jacques**  
**Samara**  
**d’Artagnapus**

“What!” he demanded down the short hallway to the kitchen. “Is that?!” 

The only answer he got was Aramis’ delighted laughter retreating down the hall, underlaid by Porthos’ softer, quieter chuckles. He sighed and grabbed at the marker hanging by a piece of string next to the board. A quick swipe, and he didn’t even bother playing fair in retaliation when he scrawled his response. 

Athos possibly smiled somewhere under his beard. "He likes you."

*

Aramis loved Porthos’ lap. He had never entertained notions of being able to sit in someone’s lap, nor reveling in the type of intimacy allowed when pressed chest-to-chest and sharing breath. But Porthos was built out of at least two of him, and could bear Aramis the same way Aramis could bear a cat, his hands resting comfortable on Aramis’ waist and smiling up at him. 

Aramis sat for hours, exploring Porthos’ mouth at leisure as the other man lay pliant and relaxed under him, sprawled out atop the deep couch. Porthos, long ago used to Aramis in his more affectionate moods, allowed Aramis free reign. He started at Porthos’ mouth, leaving his lips slick, swollen, and gasping just the way Aramis craved. He traveled across Porthos’ flushed cheeks and forehead, down the fluttering tendons in his neck, and only stopped to worship at the dent of his clavicle as Porthos’ groaned against the arm rest. Aramis in this mood was as much a test of endurance for him as it was a delight for Aramis. 

It made Aramis practically melt inside that Porthos was willing to play his games. Making it enjoyable was the least he could do to say thank you. 

Porthos whined when Aramis left a particularly delicate trail of kisses up the side of his face. 

“Gonna tease me all night?"

“That’s my plan,” Aramis replied shamelessly. Porthos squirmed under him, fighting to hold onto the control Aramis was determined to break down. “Any complaints?"

Porthos groaned and shuddered under him, and Aramis felt his breath escape his lungs and left him in awe. “I’ve got so many at this point it ain’t worth lodging them anymore.” 

Aramis cackled with breathless, unbridled glee. He cherished taking Porthos apart like this. He relished in Athos too, but he required a different approach. Athos had the masochistic endurance to be a rock in the way of Aramis’ waves, slowing falling over the course of hours (and in one gloriously agonizing occasion, days) instead of tumbling like Porthos after a little hard work and adoration.

And God, did Aramis love to adore Porthos. He was sunshine and cheer and everything dear that Aramis could imagine. He was the reason Aramis no longer felt the heavy stone of dread weighing him down as he watched yet another city disappear from his rearview mirror. He put a path under Aramis’ feet, one he was thrilled to follow. 

He didn’t trust being able to put that all into words, let alone words that sounded believable, so instead he pressed into Porthos, letting all the affection and desire he couldn’t force past his mouth speak through touch. 

Aramis had to admit he was in an odd mood tonight. The insatiability that had driven him across the country for years had returned, simmering under his skin and edging him to _do something_. He wanted to undo Porthos and leave him in a relaxed, boneless mess on the couch while he went to work on Athos. He wanted to let them drag their fingers over his skin and reach all the places that itched and burned that he could never reach himself. He wanted them all in a pile so woven together that he lost track of where one ended and another began. 

He acknowledged he wanted a lot right now. But he couldn’t help but be thrilled that he wanted it with them. The idea of roaming the city to find someone else was a vat of cold water waiting underfoot. He didn’t want to have to learn what spots would make someone else go weak, or gasp, or send them into frenzied action. Even if he tried, he’d only compare them to his encyclopedia of Porthos and Athos. 

Aramis rose from his sprawled spot across Porthos’ chest. 

“How you doing?” he called out to the kitchen. Athos made a content sound. He puttered around in the kitchen with none of the usual intense focus he displayed at the restaurant, only moving to keep his fingers busy and decompress from the day. It was his night to cook dinner, and Aramis took an almost unholy delight in these nights. Athos' thought process for recreational cooking was fundamentally different from his vocational cooking. There, he was all hot demands, urging them forward through the flames while he moved like an efficient shark through the kitchen. When he was at home, he was more a contented cat, arbitrarily throwing things together to please himself and no one else. 

Occasionally, he’d circle them instead. Aramis felt him press a kiss into the nape of his neck while he was busy working a bruise into Porthos’ pulse point. A fingers sometimes whispered across his ribs, or buried themselves in Porthos' thick curls. But then the kitchen would call to him, and he would be back to work. 

Aramis curled his arms deeper around Porthos’ shoulder and continued his good work. 

Slender hands with damp fingers pressed knuckles first against his neck. “Food’s ready,” Athos muttered. Aramis felt Porthos shudder, and wondered what Athos’ other hand was up to. 

Grumbling slightly, Aramis released Porthos. When he was motivated, he could get them down to their skin and rock hard before Athos could finish, but their third had decided to be quick tonight, and he had only risen Porthos’ heart rate enough to make his pulse thump against his neck. Aramis bestowed one last kiss and reluctantly put a pin in their activities. 

“Thank you,” he said, turning to Athos. He got a slight smile and a bashful look through dark bangs that made Athos look years younger. Aramis gave him a kiss as well, and retreated to the kitchen before revenge could be enacted against him. 

Athos had made red beans and rice with leftover peppered sausage from the restaurant’s jambalaya and rockfish baked in lemon and basil. It was a meal that made no sense when paired together, but Athos made them with love and they were delicious. Aramis loaded down his bowl and unabashedly enjoyed himself. 

Athos owned a nice, large, circular, dark oak table that was the centerpiece of the space designed for his dining room. More often than not, however, they ended up on the coach, stretched out against each other with their feet on Athos’ large coffee table with the television on. The french bread load was pulled apart with bare fingers, the serrated bread knife too inconveniently far away on the counter. Aramis eat with quick shoveling motions like a heathen, his back against Porthos’ shoulder and his feet braced against Athos’ thigh. 

This was nice, but Aramis had needs. And wants. And the first step to fulfilling those wants included making sure Athos and Porthos got a chance to relax. They dragged work home far too often these days, and Aramis needed to step up, liven up the place. Takes some weight off their shoulders so they could remember to have fun.

He'd start with the mouthy one. 

*

D'Artagnan was busy fiddling with his tie clip and apron in preparation for the start of his shift when out of nowhere, an arm wrapped itself around his shoulder. He jumped, which only caused Aramis to laugh and say, “Easy there. I have to make you an offer and you're not allowed to refuse."

D'Artagnan seriously considered refusing to be contrary, if only because it was way to early for Aramis' morning-person-ness. "Were you just lurking around back waiting for me to show up?"

Aramis' shoulder shrugged without letting go. "It's daytime. It’s not lurking if it’s daytime."

"Not daytime enough," d'Artagnan complained under his breath. He had only come in early because he wanted to walk in with Constance. Maybe it was just the ramp up for the holiday, but she seemed busier lately, what with meetings and interviews and late night conversations on the phone. He'd always been a social butterfly, but it was hard not to feel a little left out when the one person he knew in New Orleans didn't seem to have time to share with him. D'Artagnan had agreed to meet the rest of the wait-staff for drinks a couple of times, but everything in the city was a looming, cramped, loud experience that added an extra layer of effort when it came to making new friends.

So he compromised by giving Constance the space she needed in the apartment, and then trailing after her when she went outside. The city was easier to navigate with her around; and her mannerisms were familiar against the waning tides of culture shock.

Which was why he'd agreed to come in at eight, when they'd gotten home after midnight the night before. It made sense yesterday—she needed to be in early for managerial reasons, he could earn a few extra bucks taking care of some odds and ends around the restaurant—but getting rolled off the couch an hour ago had been a trial in courage and tenacity. He'd barely gotten a chance to enjoy her company as neither of them had managed more than a handful of pleasantries as they'd stumbled forward arm in arm.

Constance had grabbed her notebooks and ledgers and started stacking them along the bar top, so she was nowhere in sight to save d'Artagnan from whatever amusements Aramis had planned.

"What are you offering?" d'Artagnan asked, despite knowing he was playing with a force he couldn't control.

Aramis sidled into his field of view. He looked downright giddy as he said, "Really nice free food."

He couldn't help perking up at that. “What do I get out of this?”

“Not having to pay for it,” Aramis replied, smiling too wide for someone who was essentially volunteering to spend money on him. 

"What's the catch?” Because there had to be one.

"We're gonna make a game out of it," Aramis explained, his eyes boring into d'Artagnan as if to search out his weakness. "Three courses; three plates per course. I'd say the courses would be bite-sized, but knowing you that'd just be a deterrent."

"Wow," d'Artagnan gaped. "That's a lot of food. But that's doesn’t sounds like a catch." Not that it mattered, he thought, whatever it ended up being, d'Artagnan was going to eat it.

"There is no catch; it's just a game," Aramis looked sincere, his eyes wide and beguiling, but he ruined the effect by taking on: "Well, it's more like a test."

"Of what?"

Aramis smiled that fool's gold smile. "Your palate."

And fool that he was, interest sparked through d'Artagnan. "What am I tasting for?"

"To see which of us cooked what."

"And if I get it wrong?"

"Well," Aramis looked pleased with himself for having gotten d'Artagnan on the hook, "Then I guess you'll have to pay for it."

D'Artagnan deserved every criticism he'd ever gotten—from his dad, his mom, Constance—about his competitive streak. "You're on."

*

"Oh! This could be fun!" Constance chimed in as she looked up from her books. She had been bowed low in conversation with Porthos at the bar for most of the morning, so it was nice to see her face again as her eyes lit up with interest. "Is there a prize?"

"Not paying for it is the prize," d'Artagnan admitted. He was sat at the bar next to her, having taking Porthos' spot when the chef had disappeared into the kitchen with a strict finger wag not to follow him. Since then, a few members of the wait staff had trailed in, too early for their shift and too eager as they hid their snickers behind their hands.

"Am I being hazed?" d'Artagnan had to ask.

Constance nudged him in the shoulder. "No. You've just let your mouth get you into trouble. Literally, this time."

D'Artagnan hadn't failed to notice that none of the other waiters had as much to say to the chefs past surface-level, professional conversation. If anything, that seemed to be the norm, and d'Artagnan would probably have an easier time if he just kept his opinions to himself.

But they weren't bad opinions, he didn't think. Sometimes, not even criticisms. More like embarrassing gushing. D'Artagnan would have never said he wanted to work in a high end restaurant, but seeing what could be done to food was just so damn exciting. Hell, before coming to work at The Garrison, d'Artagnan would have said he was a decent cook. The difference, he'd learned, was that he used to judge a restaurant based on how well he could make the same dishes at home. He couldn't do that at The Garrison; there was nothing on the menu he’d stand a chance of copying at home.

"Did they tell you what they're going to make?" Constance asked.

"No," d'Artagnan said. "I assumed it would just be items from the menu."

Constance looked up from her books again to give him a sympathetic glance. D'Artagnan replayed what he'd just said, and realized with horror:

"Oh God, none of it's going to be off the menu, is it?"

Samara entered the dining room carrying a serving tray, trailed by three smug chefs without their chef coats. D'Artagnan figured that was just so he couldn't cheat by matching food to splatter stains on their coats, but mainly it was distracting to see them all out of uniform. Athos was leaner without the extra layering, and his guarded posture shouted discomfort without his uniform to button him up. Porthos somehow looked taller, like an approachable, if looming, decorative gate. The kind decorated in tattoos instead of vines and flowers. And Aramis—

Well, Aramis at least looked like himself: better looking than most, and unfairly handsome in a plain black t-shirt.

D'Artagnan was so caught up in looking that when the tray appeared in front of him, it took a sharp elbow from Constance before he looked down.

The dishes on the tray had been covered by an upside down pot and two mixing bowls.

"Either I'm not good enough for a tray cover or ya’ll are really trying to throw me off my game," d'Artagnan complained, trying to refocus on the task at hand. He nodded his thanks to Samara as she placed the three dishes in front of him. The bowls and pots didn't even fit well over the plates they were meant to cover. She had to hold the pot on top of the third plate just so it wouldn't fall off.

Definitely playing mind games with him; but he wouldn't let that slow him down. No, his best bet was just to barrel forward before he could overthink it.

He flipped over the pot covering the first plate and felt his jaw drop. Athos looked smug as Porthos and Aramis huffed shameless laughter into each other's shoulders. With a sort of naive helplessness, he flipped over the two bowls.

Three plates of neat, foamy cubes sat before him in three stomach-churningly unnatural colors. They looked like the kind of small lego structures a two-year-old would make.

"You've got to be kidding me," said d'Artagnan as he buried his face in his hands.

"Molecular gastronomy is very in these days," Athos spoke with a voice so deadpan they'd have to throw it a funeral along with the lobsters.

"Great way to play with your food," Porthos added on. "All about lookin' at flavors, and gettin' the science down right so that it comes out alright."

"And it's not duck," Aramis added happily.

He wanted to pretend that the stifled giggles beside him wasn’t Constance, but he could see her smiling from around the notebook she had brought up to hide her face.

D'Artagnan picked up his fork, then wondered, "How am I supposed to eat this?"

"However you want. That, we won't count against you," Athos offered. It would have been kind if the same hellish glee in Aramis' eyes hadn't spread to him and Porthos as well.

So not knowing what to expect, d'Artagnan gently stabbed his fork into the first cube. It was a bright, happy red one, and his fork slipped through it like air. There was no weight as he held it up close to his face.

When it hit his tongue it melted, and his eyes almost popped out of his head as carrot and chili and nutmeg danced across his tongue. Before he could savor the moment it was gone, but for the amazing flavor it left in his mouth.

"Wow," he exclaimed, his mind blown from how quickly that had gone from eye-roll worthy to incredible. "Wow. That was...I don't even know how to describe it."

"Gelatin," Porthos explained with a proud smile, except that was such a poor explanation for the experience d'Artagnan just had.

He went back in for another cube, this time sampling it in smaller pieces so he could have longer to roll the flavors around. D'Artagnan was taken aback to realize that there was something _fishy_ in the flavor. But it was hard to tell what kind of fish, or even what kind of seafood, it could be when it was cut off from the flavor. The more recognizable carrot was a nice compliment, and a fresh and unassuming balance for the more fragrant spices to play over. And with the kick of heat trailing in late to the bite, the whole thing was to die for.

"Do you know what it is?" Athos asked, and d'Artagnan shook his head because he didn't have a clue.

He knew who the chef was, though.

"It's based off of a carrot-ginger-caviar recipe. Only the kitchen doesn't have fresh ginger since the sea bass sold out last night," Aramis said as he swiped a cube for himself from d'Artagnan's plate.

"But we have caviar?" d'Artagnan questioned, mulling that over. How did he come up with that? If d'Artagnan was trying to follow a recipe and it turned out he didn't have any ginger, his first thought would be to look for a ginger substitute; not pull a whole new set of spices out of the pantry.

Definitely interesting.

Plate two was a frankly disgusting looking purple, and had more holes in it than a kitchen sponge. He could easily find a stand-in replacement for it crawling along the sea floor. Still, the first cube had been staggeringly delicious; he could give the second one a try.

Maybe it was that he was thinking of the sea already, but when he bit in to the oddly crunchy sponge, he thought of sushi.

"Miso," d'Artagnan stated, proud of himself. "This has miso in it."

Porthos boomed with laughter. "That was fast!"

As he crunched happily on the sponge, d'Artagnan tried his best to keep a straight face as confidence surged through him. This might be an easier guess than he thought.

Most of the miso soup he'd had before had been from sushi restaurants and so saturated in salt it was hard to taste any substantial flavor. But his dad had bought miso paste once. It was after his mother was gone, when his father had decided that one of the ways he'd make sure he stayed connected with his son was to make a weekly dinner every Sunday. There had been a few interesting choices his father had plucked out of the newspaper, and while d'Artagnan had to admit he found tofu completely unappealing, he remembered trying the miso paste in its raw form and being fascinated by its mealy texture.

Not that the texture was helpful here. Again, he was amazed to discover how much he relied on texture to tell him what something tasted like. Caviar he had never had, but miso was a flavor he had a strong emotional connection too. Yet he had to admit, if he hadn't been looking for something ocean-y, he wouldn't have made the connection so quickly.

There was sesame there too. Possibly a sesame oil, hiding in a sweet crunch that reminded him of a cake or a macaroon. Definitely had a sweetness that whispered cloyingly the word 'dessert.'

He wouldn't let that dissuade him; he was pretty sure before tasting the third plate that he knew who it belonged to.

The third dish was an easy yellow color. Biting in, a pleasant thickness of white chocolate coated his mouth as warm, familiar orange splashed alongside other fruity notes. A hint of raspberry, some cranberry maybe. D'Artagnan hummed happily, chasing a light shock of mint around as his third guess affirmed his second one.

He finished the last of the yellow cubes before pushing his plate forward and declaring, "Porthos."

"I went easy," said the chef in question, eyes crinkled and happy. 

D'Artagnan eyed Athos and Aramis pensively, as if he was still deciding. In reality, there was no question.

He pushed the first plate forward, "Athos." And the second plate, he slid over to, "Aramis."

"Damnit," Aramis cursed.

"How'd you decide?" Athos asked, stroking his beard as he looked at d'Artagnan thoughtfully.

"The flavors on yours were too good. The flavors on Porthos’—he was right—were too easy. He's been trying to convince me to like chocolate from day one," d'Artagnan explained, then shrugged. "With Aramis, I would have had no idea. Really would have thrown me if Porthos didn't enjoy mocking him so much when his tricks don't work."

"I regret nothing," Porthos said. Aramis smacked him in the shoulder as they retreated back into the kitchen.

Beside him, Samara stood proudly with her hands clasped together around her serve tray and a curiously gleeful expression on her face. Jacques, Emilie, and Lucy watched from the end of the bar.

"There's money riding on this," she informed him before traipsing away to join the others. Constance let out a quick, bright laugh before bending her head back towards her planner when d’Artagnan shot her a dirty look.

No pressure.

Emilie brought out the next tray with a unfamiliarly cheeky smile. Constance, who had given up all presence of working in favor of making little doodles in the margins to look busy, saw her face and laughed at d'Artagnan's expense.

"That's not boding well for you, is it?"

D'Artagnan agreed because the one permeating smell wafting towards him was the one serious gap on the menu: steak.

Where the chefs were gleeful before, they had learned their lesson after the first round. They marched before him like an army united, resolute and broadcasting smug pride as Emilie set down the next tray. 

Athos set down one small dish of a warm, pale cream sauce freckled with herbs.

"The Bearnaise," he pronounced. "Is not a part of this challenge. It's just good with steak." 

"He means to say he's the one who made it," said Aramis with a hapless shrug. "Our dear show-off."

Porthos and Athos broke their stoic fronts to stare dumbly at Aramis; but neither said a word.

The serving tray wasn’t covered this time; instead the three plates were arranged in a triangle with a fork, knife, and napkin rolled in the middle. It seemed a little late in the game to start with table manners, but he hadn’t been raise in a barn. D’Artagnan unrolled the silverware—fork to the left and knife to the right—and folded the napkin onto his lap, biding his time as he inspected the steaks.

The three chefs stood before him, waiting. 

"Well, come on then. Eat your dinner," said Porthos, crossing his arms and nodding pointedly at the plates.

“It's not even lunch yet," whined d'Artagnan, stalling for time.

"D'Artagnan," Constance cut in sweetly. "Eat the nice men's steaks or I'm going to eat them for you."  
The look in her eyes said she was far from joking, but D'Artagnan was racking his brain on where to even start with this one.

Despite his jesting with Porthos about hunting seasons, he didn’t have a background in butcher work. He could see that two of the steaks were of a similar cut, but that was about it. Fine striations ran across the width, similarly long and a decent thickness. If they were more triangular or oval in shape, he may be able to guess what they were. Like a T-bone or an eye of round; hell, a filet mignon had a certain height and girth to it. At least he could identify the third cut as a sirloin, the friendly, good-looking steak of the grocery shopper looking to impress without paying too much.  
And impress, this one did. In fact, all three were beautiful seared, with that perfect _thunking_ sound as he tapped them with his knife.  
“I'm serious, d'Artagnan,” Constance interrupted. “I've been eating fish nonstop since opening day. You have three seconds before I knock you off your barstool and eat them myself.”  
“I can help,” Emilie said. She hovered over him, eyes as wide as plates, and d'Artagnan fought the urge to cover his food.

Athos looked up at Constance curiously, "I thought you liked fish?"  
“Hey! I didn’t get any candy blocks!” Samara cut in from the end of the bar. "It's not fair if Emile gets steak when I didn't get any candy."  
"Some fish is fine," Constance explained in a soothing tone to Athos. "Sometimes it just feels like there's a thing as too much fish, you know?"

“No. No, I don’t."

Aramis leaned around Porthos to look at Samara. "It wasn't candy, but there's more in the kitchen." Samara whooped and disappeared through the back with Lucy quick on her heels.

"Fish is healthier," Athos insisted, not wanting to let that particular bone go.

“Can I serve the next one?” Jacques asked quietly from the end of the bar. Porthos nodded with a thumbs up in his direction, which caused the teen to break out into a bright grin.  
D’Artagnan ignored them in favor of finally deciding to cut into the sirloin first. He peaked between fork and knife to see it had that tantalizing medium-rare pink in the middle. God, his mouth was watering. Constance hovered at his shoulder, and he was fully prepared to fight her off if she tried to snatch his fork away.  
For the first bite he skipped over the Bearnaise. Maybe a smaller piece would have been more practical—maybe he didn't _need_ to slice off a full corner of meat— 

"Do you not know how to eat steak?" Aramis asked, chin in hand as he watched in a concerned manner. "You're supposed to cut against the grain."

"Aramis," Athos hushed.

"Just let the boy eat," add Porthos.

—but d'Artagnan didn't regret it when his teeth finally sank in. Crisp crust on the outside, slick and juicy, and the heady taste of red meat. As he chewed, a sigh broke out of his chest, and for a moment he was deeply content with his status in life.

Another piece, this time with the sauce, and d'Artagnan might have to re-evaluate Aramis' claims. That sauce had everything to do with showing off. It reminded him of a Hollandaise sauce from a diner he'd worked in. Well, it reminded him of the horrible, pre-made sauce for the Eggs Benedict, and the much better, trickier sauce his father had shown him how to make when he complained about diner food for the billionth time. The technique was everything, and d'Artagnan had no doubt a great amount of skill had been put into this.

The creaminess was familiar, reminding d'Artagnan of the creamy eggy-ness and butter of the Hollandaise but that wasn't quite right. Something acidic clung to the back. The addition of the tarragon was a nice surprise, a glimmer of green to cut through the fat. Added with the rich meatiness of the steak, it made the perfect bite.

D'Artagnan's eyes snapped open from their pleased contemplation; he'd never be able to taste the difference between steaks like this. The sauce was a trap. His gaze flicked up to meet Athos' own as the head chef watched him considerately.

Focus, he told himself. Try the other two steaks, before waxing on about the sauce.

But the next two steaks only complicated the matter. They were...similar. Very similar. He tried the second steak, then the third, and then back to the first steak, which stood apart from the others. Maybe that was just the difference in the cut. He struggled, realizing that he didn't know what words to describe steak, let alone how to determine what tasted different about them.

With a shake of his head, he grasped at the straws of what he did know. Salt, pepper, garlic, thyme—delicious, but on all three not very helpful. Cooked in oil. Except, no, that wasn't right either.

He tried the sirloin again. Olive oil. Without the coating of Bearnaise sauce masking the flavor, the second steak had obviously been basted in butter. The second steak's cut was still unidentifiable, but he could tell there was a difference in the tenderness compared to the sirloin. 

Pleased with himself, he tasted the third steak again, hoping for a revelation. What he found was more butter.

"How's it going?" Constance poked d'Artagnan in the arm.

He shot an unamused glance at the chefs. "Pretty difficult. Thanks for the Bearnaise, Athos."

Something behind his beard twitch in a way that could have been a smile.

If flavor wasn't going to help him narrow this down, and the plating was too simple to indicate anything, then that just left cooking technique. He sliced all three in half, turning each half to face him as he crouched to sit at eye levels with the plates. He poked at the first offering—maybe it was the coloring that threw him off. The sear on the sirloin was just the slightest bit more appealing than the others, but he still couldn't decided if that was the cook or the cut of the meat. He scraped his fork over the top as he considered the slight crusting of seasonings and the reddish inside, fading into an even finish on the outer levels.

Curious, he checked the second steak and felt like an idiot. Not as evenly cooked. The inside was soft and succulent, and the outside temptingly savory, but the pink in the middle wasn't as dead center as the first. The top had sat on the heat for just slightly longer than the bottom, and one side of the steak was more well-done than the other.

Checking the third, same problem. Unevenly cooked on the top...and the side. The same, long side. Sitting back in his chair, he looked at the similar steaks from afar and his mind slotted the pieces together like a puzzle. 

So one perfect steak, and two delicious steaks with two many similarities to count.

Assholes.  
Without hesitation, d'Artagnan pushed the sirloin forward and said, “Athos.”

The still look on the other man’s face was all the confirmation he needed, and he grinned. Then his eyes turned sharp as he focused his attention back to Porthos and Aramis’ offerings. They were always harder—their styles had merged after years of working together, each of their own strengths seeping into the cracks of the other. Aramis never used hazelnuts in his work because Porthos hated incorporating them; Porthos knew countless traditional culinary tricks for never having attended a traditional class. 

But one of them had made more of a point of messing with him lately—that's where he'd put his money.

“Aramis made both of these,” he declared with a glare. Aramis stared at him in shock while Porthos’ jaw dropped, and though he'd guessed in confidence d'Artagnan couldn't believe he'd been right. Victory warred with a heat crawling up under his collar. "Really? That wasn't part of the deal!"

Aramis rallied his composure and shrugged, though disbelief still widened his eyes. "We honestly didn't think you'd notice?"

“How’d you guess?” asked Athos again. He who didn't look the least bit contrite so much as openly curious. As pissed off as he wanted to be, d'Artagnan couldn't help the flutter of approval knocking around in his chest. It was fun to be challenged; especially if he won.

"The techniques gave it away. And these two," d'Artagnan gestured at the identical steaks. "Had so many similarities, I would have been lying if I'd said I could tell the difference. Look, even the sides line up where they were cooked!"

"I told him to use a bigger pan," said Athos, shaking his head. He grabbed the tray and headed into the kitchen.

An elbow nudged at d'Artagnan's arm, and when he turned he found Constance beaming at him.

"Good job," she said simply, and Constance happy—which started at the scrunch of her nose and exploded across round cheeks, rolling hair, and into the air around with cheeky kindness—was so unfamiliar a sight these days, that until he found himself on the receiving end, d'Artagnan had forgotten how much that look could split his chest in two.

Heat spilled across d'Artagnan's skin, uncomfortable but horribly familiar, and before he could find a way to suitably hide his face (damn Athos, for taking away his steaks), Constance turned to make her demands to Porthos:

"So when do I get a cake-tasting challenge? Hmm?"

Porthos grinned at her. "I'll make you a cake whenever you want."

"But not before he gets a steak?" Constance challenged, nodding at d'Artagnan. He looked up at his name and met Porthos' considering expression...

...and Aramis' intelligent, knowing gaze. His eyes flicked between him and Constance, and foreboding crawled through d'Artagnan's gut at what he saw.

"That's fair," Porthos decided. If he noticed Aramis' fleeting attention, he didn't show it. "As fun as this is, we'll come up with something fun for the rest of the house movin' forward. Themed family meals, something like that. But first," He turned to cross his arms at d'Artagnan, back to business with their contest, "Dessert's next. Know what's coming?"

D'Artagnan raised a brow, trying to put his own game face back on. "Should I know?"

Porthos shrugged, his massive arms trying to portray innocence in their casualness even as his eyes said he was as much as a scoundrel as his fellow chefs. "Maybe."

"No cheating," Aramis piped in with a warning look at Porthos.

D'Artagnan couldn't help himself, "Really? No cheating? Can I get a rule book--what was the steak challenge if not cheating?"

"Creative problem solving." Aramis leaned up from the counter, arching his back like a cat, and entwined his arm with Porthos as he led them to the kitchen. He stopped at the door as if struck by inspiration, and gave one more dazzling smile at d'Artagnan, "You'll keep your wits about during dessert, won't you, d'Artanapus?"

Knowing he was being goaded stalled d'Artagnan's brain, and all he could think to say was, "Didn't I last time?"

"Oh, you did well," said Aramis. "But remember: this is our passion. We've been at it for years. Raw talent won't be enough for you to get by if you're not going to be clever."

"Because that worked so well for you last time," he pointed out smugly.

Aramis bounced on his tiptoes, barely waiting for d'Artagnan to finish before blurting, "I guess I made a mis _stake._ "

Porthos groaned, the agony of a person who put up with this daily, as he pulled Aramis into the kitchen.

The wait between steak and dessert was longer than that between the first two courses. Constance finished taking notes in her books, and while she disappeared into the back office, d'Artagnan was joined by Lucy and Samara who had returned from the kitchen with purloined cubes ("These are better than candy," commented Lucy, who hoarded the yellow ones.) Together, they laid out their copies of the schedule for next week and balked.

"I hate the holidays," complained Lucy, thumbing through her schedule on her phone as she dutifully recorded her shift times. "All work and overtime. Oh, I wouldn't give up the money, but it'd be nice to have a chance to visit back home, you know?"

"I'd settle for not having my first exams of the semester scheduled on the same week as Mardi Gras," Samara said. D'Artagnan winced in sympathy; he'd thought she looked rundown lately. Her concealer barely hid the tired bruising under her eyes. Bet or no bet, he was impressed to see her up so early.

Lucy hummed in understanding. She rubbed small, consoling circles against Samara's arm, glancing over her shoulder to peer at the schedule, when her face twisted in confusion.

"D'Artagnan," she asked. "You're sticking around for next week, aren't you?"

He blinked. "I should be."

"You're not on the schedule."

She pointed at printed calendar, almost a copy of the servers' whiteboard with the exception that his name was spelled right. It sat below the typed names of his coworkers and looped in Constance's handwriting, but it was there. And listed next to it were his hours for the following week, written in Athos' increasingly familiar penmanship, and scratched out illegibly. 

"Ta-da!" Jacques' subdued cheer rang as he hip-checked through the kitchen doors. The tray was back, this time the dishes covered with identical mixing bowls.

Lucy was quick to fold up her schedule copy. She stood up, deftly slipped it into d'Artagnan's pocket, and whispered, "I'm sure it's a mistake." 

Samara clapped him on the back as she passed, hollering, "Constance!" down the hall as she followed Lucy to the back office.

Alone but for the tray before him and a quietly aching sense of panic, d'Artagnan wondered again what his bosses were up to. Jacques, practically vibrating with quiet happiness, grinned shyly when d'Artagnan tried to give him a pleasant smile. After all, it wasn't Jacques' fault the chefs had formed their little clique, and that prying information from them must require a secret password.

"Any hints for me this time?" he asked. Jacques looked delighted to be included in on the game, and d'Artagnan felt a pang his chest for how easy the kid was to please.

"I can't give 'way any of the chef's secrets," he confided. His voice dropped a decibel lower than expected for his face and age, and the same Creole notes that slipped from Aramis rounded out his words in a way that would bring the tips rolling in if he ever got comfortable with himself. "But I can say that they definitely saved best for last. Would you like me to do the honors, sir?"

D'Artagnan didn't have to feign his humor. Ducking his head, he asked in a loud stage whisper, "Shouldn't we wait for the chefs to come out? It is their competition."

"No," Jacques said, matter of fact. "They're too busy bickerin'. And Porthos said I can lick the bowl if you get his right. Time's a-wastin'."

"Well if you insist." D'Artagnan nodded at the tray, and Jacques unveiled the dishes with a flourish.

He'd expected harder.

At this point in the competition he was prepared to handle another crazy twist. Maybe Porthos would convince the others to each make a croquembouche. Or two chefs would make a dessert; and Aramis, a chocolate cocktail. Perhaps Athos would bring out the most ostensibly French dessert he'd ever seen, the kind d'Artagnan would have to ask how to pronounce.

But the dessert round turned out to be actual, real-people deserts; or at least, three very different plates of delicious-looking foods that he could identify.

D'Artagnan had never tried a crème brûlée before; so when he snapped through the generously golden, crackly sugar top with his tiny dessert spoon, he didn't know what to expect. Some sort of custard, obviously, but that didn't prepare him for the silky creaminess of the first bite. 

_Porthos_ , he decided, before even trying the other desserts. The brittleness of the caramel rolled with the perfect hint of vanilla, and d'Artagnan remembered vividly his first night of service, tasting the different components of the croquembouche and how easily and simply they all formed together into a masterpiece. 

"Is it good?" asked Jacques. Lost in heaven, d'Artagnan could only nod. 

Aramis emerged from the kitchen preening, and d'Artagnan tried to hide any sign of victory from his face.

"Where are the others?" he asked with feigned nonchalance as he spooned up another creamy bite of decadence. "Are they coming?"

"In time," said Aramis. "We are prepping for service back there, too."

He shot a glance at the clock and winced. That's right—actual work would need to start soon. Saddened, d'Artagnan pushed aside the crème brûlée and moved on to the next, which was possibly the most curious thing he'd seen in this restaurant.

A cookie. It was a cookie, served in the world's smallest cast iron pan. D'Artagnan eyed Aramis suspiciously, but the chef was suddenly as immobile as a large jungle cat, watching impassively as d'Artagnan twisted the cookie this and that way.

When he was younger, his parents had bought him a giant cookie cake from a nearby mall for his birthday every year. The thick cookie, decorated heavily with a nauseating level of sugary frosting, was a wonderful masterpiece to a growing, rambunctious little boy who didn't like chocolate or cakes but who was the literal definition of a small sugar child with a mighty pair of legs. His parents, wisely, had forbidden him from having any on the other three-hundred sixty-four days of the year.

This cookie cake, with it's tiny iron cooking pan, reminisced with d'Artagnan's childhood by having chocolate chips and a scoop of ice cream melting atop. It warmed d'Artagnan before the first bite.

The cookie sunk deep into the skillet, resembling a heap of baked cookie dough as d'Artagnan dipped it into the ice cream. He could appreciate now that the confections of his childhood shone because of their novelty, where as this was what a baked cookie should taste like. Warm and homey and gooey from the chocolate chips. 

By the time Athos appeared, leaning against Aramis' side before d'Artagnan realized someone had come out of the kitchen, he had finished half the cookie. In his focus to ration out the ice cream with each spoonful, he'd noticed that the amount of ice cream he'd been given was actually the perfect amount to have with each portion of cookie. When he looked up from his trance, it was to Athos speculative gaze and Aramis' easy smile.

It had to be Aramis', d'Artagnan thought as he licked his lips, only to be interrupted by Athos pointing out:

"You missed a spot." He tapped the side of his cheek. D'Artagnan flushed and hurriedly scrubbed at his face, and wondered what it said about him that he could practically hear Constance's eyeroll as she came back to the bar with Samara and Lucy in tow. She shot a pointed look at Athos as she reclaimed her seat by d'Artagnan, jostling Jacques in the process— 

"When did you take my crème brûlée?" he asked their youngest waiter, who looked up guilty at d'Artagnan from the seat over. When the hell had he moved around the bar? 

"I thought you were done," mumbled Jacques around the spoon in his mouth. D'Artagnan, struck by the fact that he'd been so caught up in eating as to miss another human moving around the room, was numb to Constance stealing his fork and grabbing her own piece of cookie.

"But what if I needed to taste it again?" d'Artagnan protested.

Jacques raised his stolen ramekin towards d'Artagnan. There was barely a bite left. D'Artagnan waved him off.

Constance asked sweetly, "Do you need to taste it again?" while she pulled the skillet closer. Lucy and Samara circled closely around her, and d'Artagnan weighed his options in that battle with a flickered look towards Aramis, who sat smugly watching the chaos.

"I guess not," d'Artagnan admitted. Lucy and Samara descended with spoons.

"Good," said Constance, claiming a large piece of cookie for herself. "Try to guess that last one quick too. I'm dying to try a piece."

D'Artagnan agreed with the sentiment; he'd saved the best for last. Had they even tried to pretend Athos hadn't made it?

The best was at its heart, just a tiny cake; but it was the prettiest damn cake he'd ever seen in his life. The sponge was perfectly rectangle, yellow and somehow speckled evenly with bright red polka dots. Decorating the top in a zigzag of piped flowers was the brightest pink frosting he'd ever seen, and a dark green glazed dripped like vines halfway down the sides, matching the mint leaves atop.

If a cake store display window had a child with a secret garden, it would be this cake. The unnatural coloring of the polka dots and flowers should have been at odds with the realistically rendered vines and the leaves, but instead served to make the whole presentation look like a hyper-real photo shoot for a magazine advertisement.

He was again reminded of his first night of service, thinking that the novelty would wear off, that he'd hit a point where having the opportunity to eat amazing food would become common place, just another day at work. But the first bite of cake nearly made him squeal.

"It's not strawberry!" he reported, grinning at Athos, then Constance. He saw out of the corner of his eye Porthos shuffling out of the kitchen to stand in line with the other chefs, but was too lost in giddiness to think about it. He pushed the cake towards Constance, eager to share now that he knew how _good_ it was. "I thought it would be because of the color, but—," His words dried up, overwhelmed, and he solved this problem by eating another piece.

"What is it then?" asked Constance, and something in d'Artagnan, hot and happy, spun out of control as he watched her eyes close with the first bite.

He rolled the flavors around, taking time he didn't need to savor them. "Raspberry. Orange extract. White chocolate in the vines, the mint leaves have these crystals of sugar—," he had to stop for another bite; he _had_ to.

"It's good," d'Artagnan mumbled around the cake. "It's really good. This is like, the best cake I've ever had. Even the sponge, it's just so fluffy and moist."

Athos hummed his agreement. "That's often the best sign that a pastry chef knows what they're doing. Everything else is just for show, but a cake? There's no hiding when you've messed that up."

"So do you know whose it is?" asked Aramis.

After the easiest round yet, d'Artagnan couldn't pretend to draw out the suspense.

"Athos," he said firmly, meeting the chef in question in the eye. Athos's returning gaze never faltered.

"Good guess," said Athos. "And the campfire cookie?"

"Aramis."

Aramis smiled, unperturbed. "And the crème brûlée?"

D'Artagnan mentally made note of how to pronounce that correctly and was secretly glad that Aramis hadn't tricked him into saying it first.

"Porthos," d'Artagnan said, pointing at the chef, who had crossed his arms and was biting his lip solemnly. The three chefs shared a wordless, meaningful look; and as one they burst out laughing.

"Wrong!" Aramis crowed victoriously, "It's about damn time, too. You put up a hell of a fight."

From his side, d'Artagnan heard a short, cut-off snicker, and when he turned he found Lucy, eyes bright and glinting through unshed tears, trying desperately to hold back her laughter. Samara coughed into her napkin, clearly having been caught off guard with laughter while eating. Jacques gave him a not-so-helpful thumbs up which he abruptly turned into a thumbs down.

And d'Artagnan realized far too late that if he wanted to look for clues, he could have looked to the other employees, who had been in and out of the kitchen through the rounds. Cakes, cookies, and crème brûlées probably took longer to make than the entire contest; they had to have started them before _round one._ But that didn't explain— 

"What part did I get wrong?" he demanded. He looked down at the cake in betrayal. It was too good, so beautifully executed that he would have to fly to Paris to find something else that looked this good. It had to be Athos', it had to be.

"It's not Athos' cake," said Porthos, beaming delightedly at d'Artagnan before flickering his gaze shyly around the room. If he didn't know any better, d'Artagnan would think he looked _embarrassed._ Pleased as punch, but his large shoulders hunched in as his fingers circle nervously on the table. 

Realization dawned on d'Artagnan like the sun from behind a storm cloud. He looked at Porthos in wonder, "You?"

Porthos nodded, fit to explode with pride, and even Athos couldn't resist happily clapping him on the the back.

D'Artagnan didn't resist at all: he lunged over the bar top and pulled the big chef in for an enthusiastic hug.

"That was incredible," d'Artagnan huffed as Porthos happily tried to squeeze the air from his lungs. "Seriously, that cake is one of the best things I ever eaten."

"Yeah," Porthos agreed. Confidence was a great look on him when he pulled back. "You can tell the customers that when we roll it out as a special."

"Are you kidding? I'm going to be telling strangers on the street about that cake," he gushed, smile so wide it hurt.

Athos snorted. "Great. Because we need more customers." He could grouch all he wanted, but he look pleased for Porthos too.

"Please, _lamour,_ " rebuked Aramis. "We're certainly not succeeding because of your culinary endeavors with everyone's favorite course." He produced a tasting spoon from his chef coat pocket and swept up the remaining crumbles of the campfire cookie. "Did you know that when designing the menu, Athos originally wanted to make cookies the desert option?"

Athos blushed, poorly hidden behind his beard. He scowled at Aramis, who winked before lasciviously licking up the rest of the cookie, and if Athos blushed harder at that then at least d'Artagnan wasn't alone.

"I can make dessert," defended Athos. "And everyone likes cookies."

D'Artagnan looked from the cookie skillet with a name cuter than anything he'd suspect his boss of naming, up to the man that was making his boss blush by licking the remnants of chocolate and ice cream from the dish.

"Wait," he asked, perhaps dumbly at this point, "You made the crème brûlée?"

Aramis paused, giving d'Artagnan an exasperated look. Spoon still in mouth, he met eyes with Porthos and gestured to d'Artagnan.

Porthos translated, "We thought that'd be the easiest one for you to get."

"How?"

"He gets to play with fire when he makes it," explained Athos.

"That's not fair," complained d'Artagnan. Aramis grinned like a cat with a mouthful of canary and wagged his spoon at d'Artagnan.

“Well, now you’re just gonna have to work here full time to pay that bill off,” Aramis unconvincingly bemoaned. 

He opened his mouth to respond but with comeback forthcoming, turned back to his cake instead. It was missing. Slightly hidden behind Constance, Emilie was empty handed but for the smallest lick of pink frosting on her nose. He tapped his nose at her; she swiped quickly at her face.

Deprived of the rest of his dessert, stomach full of steak and weirdness, and now in debt to three sadistic chefs, it was a sulking d'Artagnan that stopped by the white board on his way to fetch an apron for service. Staffing the restaurant that night would be Lucy, Emilie, Jacques, Samara, and 'That Doesn’t Even Make Sense, Aramis'. 

*  
**Lucy**  
**Emilie**  
**Jacques**  
**Samara**  
**Hush Puppy**

D’Artagnan flat out growled. Tired from service, he wasn't in the mood to be elegant; he scrawled ‘Fuck you, Aramis’, felt bad, erased it, and drew in a frowny face instead.

That about summed up his feelings after service. 

The Day of the Duck, as d'Artagnan thought back on it, had been deceivingly easy. If he was bitter about losing the taste-testing game, which he was a bit, he could at least recognize that loading up on food at the beginning of the day was probably the only reason he'd made it to the end. Service had started well, the staff hyped up on the morning's competition and contagiously cheerful with the guests. The first few tables tipped generously, and if the chef's had lost any time during the morning's prep, it didn't show.

Not for the first hour, at least. Two hours in, and the wait times dragged longer. Another hour, and the any remaining cheer was sucked from the room when a guest tripped into Samara, who even at her quickest didn't have the reflexes to save the entrée of a guest who had been waiting for an hour. The customer, upset at the added delay, raged quietly at Samara, who cleaned quickly and apologized profusely, but as the sound a breaking plate had culled the noise in the dining room, everyone heard the uncomfortable exchange as clear as day.

Privately, d'Artagnan thought Samara handled the situation with aplomb. She empathized with the woman, and in short time had a new order put in and flown out of the kitchen in record time. But the atmosphere of discontent permeated from Samara's table onto d'Artagnan's, and by the time Samara's ticket was being paid—he winced when he caught sight of the tip, and three-figure meal with a line of zeroes underneath—his own table was making threats on what would happen if their own food didn't arrive as quickly as hers.

It didn't end there. In his rush to please his tables, d'Artagnan misheard an order. He had to march in to Athos and explain why the perfectly poached trout was being sent back, and they had to rush a ticket for the catch of the day. When he returned hang-dogged to the dining room, he passed Constance at the hostess station, where the woman from Samara's table was nastily chastising Constance for running a scam, charging people an arm and a leg for poor service.

The face Constance gave him was apologetic as she sat down the next party, the one that had been in earshot of the woman's tirade, in his station. He understood her reasoning and tried to turn up the charm. All in all, between that table and the mess up with the trout, d'Artagnan pulled in less than a quarter of what he should have made on the food alone. That trend followed through the evening with the wait times increasing. D'Artagnan was lucky for the morning's meal in that he was able to push through lunch while passing his breaks off to the others. He recouped some of his tips through dinner service as desserts began to roll out. But even the best Porthos rolled out could only pad bellies and checks so much.

Later that evening, after all their customers had been ushered through, fed, and their money collected, the staff migrated towards the bar. D’Artagnan may be the newest member on staff, but he'd keyed on quick to this inner ritual and honestly didn't need the excuse to sit down. 

Instead of making her usual beeline to Samara, Lucy linked arms together with d'Artagnan in a friendly flirtation, which he was fine exchanging. The second thing after food that he liked about this place was the people, and on nights like tonight, D’Artagnan especially liked working with someone like Lucy—she was fast on her feet and witty without being cruel. She hadn't hesitated to keep tabs on d'Artagnan's other tables during his ticket debacle, and when she'd heard he'd given over his lunch break to Samara so that she could take a breather, Lucy had been quick to offer him a hug and a share in her stash of chocolate pieces.

“Good job today,” she congratulated. “And I don't just mean during service. I really didn’t think you’d last that long, especially when Aramis came up with the steak plan."

D'Artagnan, welcoming the change in topic, teased back, “Ohh, did I lose you money?”

“Only a little bit,” she replied with a cheeky smile. “Wanna help me win it back? I’m pretty sure I can get a round of strip poker started, and between the two of us we’d make a killing.” 

“I can’t play poker—I’m a horrible bluff.” 

“Oh babe, after a few rounds, you wouldn’t have to.” 

D’Artagnan let out a loud laugh. “Come on. You work here, how are you so deprived of entertainment?” 

“I work straight through Friday and Saturday, and I miss all the good nightlife in a city that’s only bested by Las Vegas,” Lucy explained with a bemoaned expression. “I gotta find my kicks were I can.” 

Emilie, next to them and mostly keeping to herself, couldn’t contain her mirth at that. 

“Don’t listen to her,” she advised d’Artagnan in her low, hypnotic voice. “Tomorrow, try to keep track how often she gets invited to other people’s ‘kicks’ during service. Trust me, if she wanted to, she’d be plenty entertained.” 

“You,” Lucy said with a wave of her hand. “Notice far too much for my liking.” 

The cooks materialized from the kitchen looking as worse for wear as the staff. He kept an eye on Athos as he went to Constance. Surely, she had rougher nights, but tonight had smudged away her exuberance from the morning. Athos seemed to notice it too, patting Constance awkwardly on the arm and nodding carefully as she rushed into a flurry of words that d'Artagnan would bet had nothing to do with numbers today.

The groan Porthos gave as he rolled his shoulders was that of a discontent bear's. He wasn't immune to the evening, tired and peaked in way that made d'Artagnan worry if he had missed lunch too. His hair sprung every which way, free of the usual bandana, and sweat beaded along his hairline. Clearly he was exhausted, but he trumped them all for enthusiasm as he took his place behind the bar.

Comfortable and in his element, Porthos flipped a glass through the air, filled it from the tap, and drank it down in four great gulps.

“What can I get you?” he asked in the face of d’Artagnan's amazed and appalled expression. 

“Grape Crush?” he asked back, curious if Porthos would know it. He’d had to explain its composition to more than one bartender.

The giant lion man snorted and grabbed the vodka off the top shelf without even reaching.

“Really?” he asked, but d’Artagnan dismissed his disbelief with a wave of his hand. His fruity, fuzzy drink was cheap, sweet, and fantastic; and he'd had a long day. 

“I can’t believe you still drink that,” Constance hissed as she stole the seat next to him, pulling out the pins in her hair and shaking her curls out. “It’s such a fussy drink.”

Instead of answering, d’Artagnan reached out to scratch his nails down her back. He meant it in quick retaliation, but she groaned and leaned forward, letting her forehead drop onto the bar, leaving him honor-bound to continue as Porthos finished his drink. 

“Gin and lime?” Porthos guessed as he added 7-Up into d’Artagnan’s low-ball glass, which was now the color of Barney the Dinosaur. 

“Yes, please,” she requested. Porthos slid d’Artagnan’s glass over to him and got to work on Constance’s next, his easy body language broadcasting familiarity. D'Artagnan watched, fascinated, as Porthos twisted slices of lime together to make a bright flower, which he poked through with a stir straw. Patting Constance twice on her hair, he gently slid her drink to her before moving on to the next order.

Constance's head lifted in a wave of hair as she knocked back a large gulp of her drink. It was cute to watch the way her nose crinkled; ever since the first time they'd tried beer together—far too young, back behind someone's barnyard party—Constance had been the kind of drinker who insisted on having more at the detriment of flavor. To her, proving she could drink something hard and tasteless was as much a proof of her competence as being able to hold her liquor.

D'Artagnan quirked a smile. Maybe she wouldn't mind having a little impromptu contest. Nothing outrageous—not at work—but some game of daring to take the edge off. It felt like it'd been ages since he'd gotten the chance to spend time with his best friend.

Her cellphone went off. D'Artagnan felt his face fall as she answered it briskly, 'Hello?", and then moved towards the windows so as not to disturb anybody. Without trying to eavesdrop, he heard a sharp gasp and then a breathless chuckle. He glanced over his shoulder and Constance had the tips of her fingers lifted to her chin, just short of covering an incredulous smile as she listened to the voice over the phone.

It was good, he decided. Lonely, but it was nice to see Constance made happy, so he resolutely scanned the room for someone else to talk to.

Lucy had migrated down the bar when d'Artagnan wasn't looking. Samara still resembled a dark, simmering cloud, but she unfurled as Lucy prodded her into talking about her latest poetry assignment. The two chatted away, heedless to the rest of the room, while Emilie gratefully took the white wine Porthos offered her and cracked open a battered paperback across the bar top. For Jacques, technically too young for anything alcoholic, Porthos shook together a mix of strawberries, lemonade, iced tea, and served it up in a glass rimmed with raw sugar. The teen laughed at his fancified drink, but brought it with him as he was pulled into a card game with Serge and Florian at the far end of the bar. 

"They offered to handle clean up today."

D’Artagnan jumped when Athos appeared on his other side. The man was a mess, bright-eyed intensity circled by acres of frazzled beard, and although his chef's coat was neatly buttoned and prim down to his rolled up sleeves, he had a glossy burn along the pink of his thumb and smaller scorch marks running along his sleeves. He barely grunted at him, but before d'Artagnan could get a word in, Athos boosted himself across the bar. The momentum continue swung him close enough to snake his hand under the bar, and he reappeared after a moment with a long-stemmed, red wine glass to sitting next to d'Artagnan as if none of that had happened. 

“Can you grab me the cab', Porthos?” 

Porthos handed over a half-empty bottle of wine from a hiding place behind a few bottles of tequila. D’Artagnan was too busy watching Athos fill a full-bellied wine glass near to brim that he almost missed Aramis snaking in behind the bar and into Porthos’ personal space, his hands dancing like butterflies around the other's waist as he pawed for the vodka. Porthos, in turn, danced into his way with every pass, until finally Aramis lunged around him in a hug to grab the bottle by the neck. 

“Hey you,” Porthos muttered, low enough that d’Artagnan figured he wasn’t suppose to hear. He smiled indulgently as Aramis filched the cocktail mixer from the bar, bumped up to his tiptops, and dropped a kiss onto Porthos’ cheek. 

D'Artagnan did not choke on his drink. Checking quickly out the corner of his eye, he was glad to see he had not drawn Athos' attention—his boss stared vacantly at the wall ahead with the kind of mind-numbing acceptance that hurt to think about—because it was already hard enough to reign in the urge to crow out some sort of cheer. It was if the world was a one way mirror and he'd been stuck to the wrong side this whole time. His stumble over clarity was so obvious in hindsight he couldn't think they'd been hiding, but so obtuse he felt proud of himself for catching on.

He gulped at his drink. It tasted like grape soda got kicked in the face by high-grain alcohol. D'Artagnan winced; and when he opened his eyes, Aramis, shaking the mixer in one hand, stared back.

"Earth to Athos," said Porthos, snapping his fingers in front of the man until his thousand-yard stare drew back to a foot-and-a-half away. Athos, tired in a way that passed exhaustion in the rearview mirror, blinked long and slow at Porthos. Clearly trying to rejoin the land of the living.

He sniffed, "Long day," and left it at that.

"C'mon, man," Porthos cajoled. He grabbed what was left of the Cabernet and poured it into a glass for himself, which he clinked against Athos'. "We had worse. And it wasn't all bad."

Those striking eyes flickered at d'Artagnan, who hoped he was being considered as part of the 'wasn't all bad.' He was still kicking himself over the fish mishap, but he toasted Athos with his own drink and a hopefully optimistic 'please don't kill me' look. 

Something behind Athos' beard both twitched and scrunched; he nodded at d'Artagnan's drink. "What is that?"

"Delicious. Do you want some?"

The weariness that had clung to every nook and cranny of Athos' disposition since meeting him was briefly flooded out with aghastment at the proffered purple drink.

"No. No, I do not want some," he spoke gravely. Then, to Porthos, "Why?"

"'Is what he ordered."

"Huh," Athos sipped at his wine, not dropping eye contact with Porthos. "That it for the drink orders, then?"

Porthos gestured at Aramis, "Except for this one, who's just foolin' himself if he thinks he knows how to make a good martini. You know you're supposed to pour out the excess vermouth?"

"Not the way I was taught," quipped Aramis, stabbing a second skewer full of olives. Porthos shook his head in dismay; Athos' gaze didn't leave Porthos.

"See, he's got it under control," Athos lied despite the fact that Aramis was now lining the rim of his glass with alternating limes and lemons, which d'Artagnan was sure wasn't right. "No reason you can't call it an early night."

Porthos shrugged, his shoulders seeming to double in size.

"No."

Aramis opened his mouth to speak, thought better of it, and took a sip of his drink. His face pinched like he had sucked on a lemon, and d'Artagnan wondered how much alcohol he'd used.

Athos was quiet like a falling boulder in the wake of Porthos' response. Finally he said, in a tone that brooked no arguments, "Go home."

Porthos sipped his half-full glass of wine. "It's bad for morale."

"I can keep the morale up," Aramis interjected with a lift of his glass and a waggle of his eyebrows. 

"Aramis can keep up morale," Athos echoed. "You look dead on your feet."

Porthos leaned in to Athos' space, his face looming in close. D'Artagnan couldn't help checking for Aramis' reaction, but before anything untoward happened Porthos reached out with two fingers and tapped Athos hard on the shoulder. 

Athos tumbled backwards, flailing for balance as he tried not to spill his drink while he grabbed for the bar top. His feet stumbled to the ground as he fumbled to right himself, almost swaying with the effort. The wine didn't spill, but Porthos' point had been made clearly enough:

"You're dead on your ass," he said gruffly. "Lucky enough that you never drive your car in. We'd find you asleep at the wheel and wrapped 'round a tree."

"Or you both could walk each other home."

They turned to look at Aramis as if shocked to remember other people were present. D'Artagnan fixated on sipping at his drink in hopes of blocking out the quickly escalating situation.

"Seriously," Aramis continued. "I'm not one to break tradition, let alone one as sacred as Friday night drinks, but we might as well take advantage of Serge and Florian being available and offering their services. I'll help the old men with tear down; and you two cranky curmudgeons can take the win and get a decent night's sleep for once."

Athos, spinning his wineglass haphazardly between his hands, was the first to relent: "I'll go home if he goes."

"Fine," said Porthos.

"Fine," said Athos. "But I need to cover some things with Constance first."

"Then let's go talk to Constance." Porthos plucked the wineglass away from him, pinching it together with his own glass between the fingers of one hand while his other hand tugged at Athos' elbow. Leaving d'Artagnan with Aramis. 

"So do you mix your own herb de provence?” he asked benignly, like asking for the weather. He was desperate for anything that changed the tension. Aramis gave him a look.

"I never thought I'd say this to someone who wasn't Athos, but could we please not talk about food for two minutes?" he insisted. Like the other two he looked tired, but there was something soft and considerate about his face as he watched the other chefs cornering Constance at the window. She had them stopped with a finger as she wrapped up her phone call.

Aramis scratched at the base of the small ponytail holding back his bangs before snapping the whole thing off in one go. He shook his hair up, quickly tying the whole mess into a bun while his teeth held on to his hair tie. D'Artagnan was searching for a different, easy topic of workplace discussion when Aramis decided to just jump into the deep end of the conversational pool:

“So how did a boy from the Everglades end up in New Orleans with nothing to his name?” 

“Just life,” d’Artagnan parried. His fingers skittered against the edge of his glass. Aramis noticed, and d'Artagnan forced his grip to tighten on his drink as he took a sip. 

“Well ‘just life’," Aramis asked, overly-pleasant, "What kind of kitchen experience do you have?"

“What makes you think I have any?” D’Artagnan dodged. Maybe it was just the day he'd had, but being asked to reveal a portion of the stupid hopes and dreams he'd had after high school—even without context, without talking about his dad—felt too much like being pried into today.

Aramis gave him a bland look. “You’ve got a palate, and you didn’t freak out about getting shoved into a mad house your first night. You’ve got experience.” 

“I waited tables at a greasy spoon through high school. Worked my way up to being a fry cook. Past that it was just family cooking, grandma’s recipes and dad’s BBQ.” He sounded sure and steady; good for him.

Aramis eyed him up and down. “You sure you don’t have any French in you?” 

“Not a drop.” 

Aramis still looked unconvinced, but changed to a new, worser topic:

“How do you know Constance?” 

“Hmm?” D’Artagnan hummed, buying for time. "What makes you think I—,"

"She hired you in less than day," he pointed out. "She usually takes at least a week for things like that." D'Artagnan gaped; he hadn't known that.

In the mirror behind the bar, d'Artagnan could see Constance talking to Athos and Porthos, her finger wagging around the grip she still had on her phone.

"She called me out of the blue," he half-lied, "It's been a long time since we've known each other, but she reached out to me online and I was in the market for a job."

"Uh-huh," Aramis said, sipping his martini. "So you dated?"

_Shit._ "I swear, she wouldn't give a job to someone unless she thought they could do it," d'Artagnan insisted as sincerely as possible. "She loves working here; she wouldn't jeopardize that."

Aramis blinked. "I know that."

"You do?"

"Obviously," said Aramis, befuddled that this was in question.

"Okay," d'Artagnan bit his lip, trying to piece this together with Constance's initial hesitation, and came up with, "But she's still worried about people knowing, about how it'll make her look. Could you maybe not bring it up?"

"Of course," he agreed quickly. D'Artagnan breathed a sigh of release. He hadn't wanted to tell Constance he'd been found out basically the second someone cornered him about it.

Then, more neutrally, Aramis asked, "So what exactly is she worried about? You've done fine. Better than fine, even, if the only experience you came here with is from a 'greasy spoon'. Do they use _herb de provence_ at greasy spoons?"

D'Artagnan rolled his eyes at Aramis' lame attempt at humor. But he appreciated the effort.

"She just doesn't want this to reflect badly on her if it doesn't work out, you know? Not that she thinks I would have made things difficult, but you never know how the people in your life are going to get along."

"So why risk it?" Aramis asked. He didn't sound judgmental, merely curious, but when d'Artagnan met his eyes, they tested him right back with a steeliness he wasn't prepared for. It was an expression he was more likely to find on Athos or Porthos; he hadn't known Aramis capable of it.

D'Artagnan cast about for the right words. "Because...she wants you to succeed. And she trusts me."

"And that's enough?"

"I could have failed," d'Artagnan admitted. "If you'd seen an application from me, you probably would have kicked me out faster than those chefs on Duck Day—,"

Aramis grinned. "Duck Day?"

“—but after starting, I would have told Constance if I was in over my head," d'Artagnan finished decisively, the words coming more surely as he thought them out. "I'd show myself out if I thought it was an issue."

Aramis, seeming mollified at his answer, actually smiled at that. "Well don't do that. You're one of the best waiters we've got."

D'Artagnan smiled. Aramis tipped his martini towards him and they clinked glasses, and for a moment d'Artagnan thought that may be the end of that. In hindsight, he'd missed the point of the conversation by a mile.

"Has Constance mentioned to you where our projections stand for amount of tables turned during Mardi Gras?" Aramis asked.

His head hurt just to think about it. "Yes. Line twice it's length out the door, and a special menu to increase speediness of dishes out the kitchen during lunch. Sounds fun."

"Well, if by fun, you mean all hell on earth," Aramis shuddered, probably not even for show. "Honestly, you should have been here during Christmas. We could have given you antlers and a bright red nose—that would have cheered up the dining room when we sold out on half the menu midway through dinner service."

D'Artagnan was grateful he could only imagine.

"Anyways, we're much more prepared this time around. And with any luck we'll actually have another chef hired in time. Athos is even working on streamlining tasks between stations so if we do get lucky this week, we can train on the job. All they'd have to handle is prep and maybe the fryer."

"That poor soul."

"Yeah," Aramis agreed. "We should really get that fixed. So that just leaves staffing. Athos wants to open all seven days that week."

D'Artagnan looked at him in shock. "We do not have the wait staff for that."

"Not even close," he admitted. "Thankfully, we know someone who currently owes us for an unpaid tab of food."

"...Wait," d'Artagnan paused, trying to put it together. "Is that what the contest—Are you trying to bribe me to work more hours for _food?_ Because the food is excellent, but I really do need the money."

"You'll still get paid," Aramis was quick to reassure. "We wouldn't do that, but we do have a...logistical problem with the schedule."

"Which is?"

"No one else wants to pick up extra hours. Or they can't pick up extra hours. We changed the schedule so everyone works longer days this week, and then has an extra day off to make up for it, but when we did that it left one spot where someone would have to work every day on the week. You'd make a lot in overtime of course."

As far as offers went, that wasn't too bad. He _did_ need money, and the challenge food had been amazing. He certainly didn't have plans for his days off. Honestly, this seemed like a lot of work and convincing for something d'Artagnan would have agreed to do in the first place if they'd just asked.

"So the food was just to convince me to work extra days this week?" d'Artagnan clarified. "I can do that."

"Well, not just for that," Aramis said ellusively. "But thanks for offering. Since you offered I'm gonna put your name on the schedule."

"I am offering," he said. "That's my point. I want to help."

"For Constance?" Aramis clarified, and if he smiled one more time, d'Artagnan was going to jump across the bar and ring his neck.

"Yes, alright? Yes, for Constance, but also for you stupid assholes," he snapped. It wasn't loud enough to be considered shouting, but anyone else could feel free to listen because he wasn't going to keep it quiet. "I didn't grind through service because you bribed me with food; I did it because I want to do a good job. I like working here. But you and Athos and Constance, you all keep dancing around the issues and you don't let anybody _help._ Porthos wants to help. I want to help. But we can't if you don't let us."

Aramis went quiet while d'Artagnan ranted. It was the stillest he'd ever seen the charismatic man, and maybe it was the grape crush talking, but having the time to study his face only made him seem more stupidly handsome than usual. And maybe that was just d'Artagnan, or maybe it was because, without the exuberant showmanship, Aramis had a kind, thoughtful face. Even in somberness, he was the kind of person that had an aura of understanding and sincerity.

"Well, you do speak your mind," Aramis said in the defeated tones of someone who was all too aware of their shortcomings. D'Artagnan felt bad for not-shouting. Even if it was true, his job's pressures probably didn't hold a candle to playing owner to the problems.

"I'm sorry, I—What can I do? To help?"

Aramis' eyes slipped towards Athos and Porthos—d'Artagnan wasn't sure the man noticed how often he did that—before looking at d'Artagnan with that steel back under his congenial expression.

"Can you keep a secret?" he asked. Annoyance resurface in d'Artagnan. He sarcastically rolled his eyes, but nodded.

"I may know someone who can fill in during Mardi Gras," he admitted.

"Oh, thank God," blurted d'Artagnan. 

Aramis offered a wry smile. "I wouldn't say that just yet."

"Why?"

Aramis looked him dead in the eye. "What's it like to work with an ex?"

The grape crush left a sticky sweetness in his mouth as d'Artagnan took a long chug of his drink. He followed Aramis' gaze back to Porthos, who was keeping a close eye on Athos and Constance as they definitely talked about her dreaded numbers. Feeling their attention, Porthos's head popped up and he gave them a wave. The distance didn't dim the toothiness of his smile or the bounciness of his curls. Knowing what d'Artagnan knew now of their relationship, he empathized with Aramis: he too would be torn up if he was about to disappoint their gentle giant of a chef.

"Does he know?" d'Artagnan asked, hoping beyond hope, near blind optimism.

"Not yet." Aramis, help him, looked uncomfortable as his fingers ticked nervously along his mustache.

"Does he know him? Or, uh, her?" 

Aramis huffed an unhappy laugh. "No, and for that I do thank God. Not exactly a shining part of my romantic history, that one. Not even sure if they'll get along."

"Then why risk it?" he heard himself echoing Aramis' earlier question. But he was honestly flummoxed that Aramis would entertain bringing someone on the line if there was even a chance that Porthos might not like them. "Are things really bad enough that you think inviting in more drama is going to improve things?"

"Have you seen them lately?" hissed Aramis. He gestured at the huddled threesome at the window, and then down the bar at the wait staff for good measure. "I know you're new here, but they haven't always looked like that. We are getting buried, and I'm trying to dig us up without a shovel. And it wouldn't be full-time. They'd cover for next week, and that's it, they're out the door. Then we can get on with Athos trying to find someone full time."

"Still doesn't sound like a great idea," he mumbled. Grasping at straws in the face of obstinateness, he asked, "Are you sure we couldn't get in one of the chefs we already interviewed?"

Aramis shifted guiltily. D'Artagnan poked him hard in the arm.

"Stop that," he swatted his hand away. "And I tried."

D'Artagnan gaped. "You did? How— _when_?"

Aramis flipped out his cellphone. "It's a new era. Who cares how you get a job offer these days? Unless you've been hired already." He shook his head in disappointment. "Or you're now so scared of the guy running the place that you've decided to go back and finish your accounting degree."

D'Artagnan didn't know what to say to that, but, "Wasn't there a third one?"

The look Aramis gave him was second only to Athos' in scariness. Still, sick as it made him feel, he needed to ask, "You didn't call him, right? The one Athos said was in early—?"

Aramis' voice was deathly cool as he asked, "The one who tried to hit on Jacques?"

D'Artagnan's skin crawled. "Yeah, no. Fuck that guy. Just checking."

Aramis hummed his agreement, but most of his attention had drifted back over d’Artagnan’s shoulder. Porthos and Athos weren't the only ones looking worse for the wear. The shine of charisma that dazzled d'Artagnan on his first day had muddled down to regular human normal, if still unfairly handsome with his disheveled bun. 

D'Artagnan watched Aramis. Aramis, slouched and unhappy, had eyes only for the other side of the room. D'Artagnan would call it mooning, if he didn't look so sad about it.

Spurred by empathy, d'Artagnan breathed deep and took the plunge.

"Do what you have to do."

*

Porthos walked in the back door to the bakery at 4am Sunday morning and received a face-full of flour for his efforts.

"You're late," Sylvie admonished, wiping the excess powder onto her apron. Two days in to the job and she was putting the lot of them to shame. Sure enough, she already had the morning buns on the rise, and based on rows of donuts she had already cut out, she had gotten a start on Porthos' checklist alongside of her own.

Porthos snorted, unsurprised. Alice's newest hire was a force to be reckoned with. 

"Sorry 'bout that—ran late at the restaurant. We was supposed t' get someone new in tonight and the guy never showed, then the fryer acted up during service and splattered oil all over and clean up was a nightmare. I'm lucky I escaped, thought Athos was gonna make us start prep then and there."

"Oof," Sylvie had the kind of eyes that twinkled when she ribbed someone, "Your boy's riding you hard these days, inn't he?"

"Sylvie!"

Porthos was saved from answering by Alice, standing at the door, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Porthos envied her well-rested face, her fully staffed kitchen, and the fact that he couldn't even be mad that she had snagged Sylvie out from under them. That was his weakness: being impressed when he should be looking out for himself.

Porthos couldn’t conceive of anything that would tear him from Aramis and Athos, but there had been a time were Alice pulled at him. She was the storm, Porthos didn't have a chance of staying upright.

Instead he ended up with a pair of hurricanes. 

“You tell Athos I stole his interviewee yet?” she asked. Sylvie snorted and gave her dough another rough beating. Porthos thought he heard a muffled “stuck-up prick” from her corner of the room. 

"Constance told him on Friday."

Alice whistled appreciatively. "Didn't wait long, did she? I told her Friday afternoon."

"I know. I was there. She read Athos the riot act for scaring off another chef. Says next one he chases off, she's bumping him down to busboy."

"That's my girl."

Porthos smiled, but a tired shiver racked through him as he grabbed his apron. His hands shook as he looped it over his head.

“I could bump the heat up,” Alice offered.

Porthos glanced down at his outfit; jeans and a button up, nothing that couldn't warm him up from the chill outside.

"Nah. I'll be fine as it is with the ovens runnin'."

"You sure I can't convince you to get that shirt off?"

That burned the chill off his cheeks quicker than sticking his head in the oven. Porthos shuffled, awkwardly pleased to have the attention. For a widow, Alice sure know how to make a smooth entry.

"Oh, I think I'll make you work a little harder than that."

Sylvie banged a tray of plastic-wrapped dough on the counter between them.

"Pastry knots," she said, and then she was gone in a whirlwind. Hard to argue with someone so efficient. Porthos pulled out the rolling pin, only realizing when he was dusting the table with flour that Alice was still at his shoulder.

"What's up?"

From the corner of his eye, he saw her hand twitch up, like she was about to touch his face; but she aborted the move fast, and Porthos was too exhausted to think much on it.

"Nothing," Alice said. "Is everything really going alright at the restaurant?"

Porthos shrugged, "Business as usual."

Alice bit her lip. Porthos sighed; he was pretty sure he knew what this was about.

"'S'all right. You were right to snap her up when you did."

"Doesn't mean I wanted to leave you and yours hangin' out to dry," she said softly. Some Creole slipped in under her words, and Porthos missed Aramis and Athos with the sudden force of a freight truck. It hit him sometimes, that as much as he loved Alice and all the possibilities she gave him, there was something alien about standing in a kitchen without his team at his back. He tried to focus on cutting the strips for the pastry knots instead. 

"Wasn't meant to be," he allowed. "Maybe it's the timing, or maybe we're just cursed. Either way, we ain't had a stroke of luck since New Years. But we'll get through it. Be dead on our feet by the end, but we will. Also—what's with this act, like you weren't gonna fight us for Sylvie if we did hire her?"

Her face pouted in pretend outrage. "Damnit, Constance."

"Uh-huh."

"I would have fought nicely."

Porthos gave her a disbelieving look, he's fingers frozen in tying a length of pastry into a knot.

"Oh, come on now! You'd understand where I was coming from if you tried one of her bacon muffins."

It was Porthos' turn to give an exaggerated pout. "But you don't even like bacon. You wouldn't try my bacon donuts."

"I know! _That's how good these muffins are."_

Porthos snorted. "So you like her muffins more than mine?"

"Oh Porthos," Alice said in a voice overly thick with condolence She looped her finger into the pastry he was tying and gave it a little tug. "You're still my favorite bread maker. Better than anything I could by in a store." 

That hint of innuendo was back, and Porthos couldn't help giving a little back. "What, you never baked bread with your husband?"

"My husband never had your hands."

Porthos' blush was immediate and mortifying. _"Damnit, Alice."_

A high peal of laughter came from behind and Porthos cursed himself for forgetting about Sylvie. He hadn't even noticed her moving the donuts, but she had the fryer a-sizzle and was perched against the counter, watching them. She was almost as much of a headache as d'Artagnan, blending in to the kitchen like she belonged when it was her second day. Couldn't even pretend to be new and unsure, let alone act like she wasn't enjoying the show they were putting on.

Porthos needed to get his head in the game. "How're the donut's?"

"Cooking. Which is all a fryer should do."

At least Alice was gracious enough to stifle her laugh. She patted Porthos on the shoulder before straitening, bossy authority settling over her shoulders as she prepared to get back to work.

"I've got a batch of fritters that needs mixing. After the knots, start in on those. Help decorate the donuts when they're done."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And Porthos?"

"Hmm?" He looked up; the concern of earlier had settled across her brow again. Her eyes flicked over his face, up to his sweaty hairline, and down sloppy rolled up sleeves. For a second, he wondered if she was going to send him out of the kitchen to clean up. He'd washed up after dinner service of course, couldn't shake the habit even if he was going out to a second job, but he was sure he looked as wasted on his feet from exhaustion as he felt.

Alice shook her head sadly. "Just take it easy, alright? Sylvie's new; let her burn off some of that new-job excitement. We'll try to get you out of here early this morning."

Porthos didn't know what was worse—the fact that for the first he could remember, he was too knocked out to insist on working harder; or the fact that his first, instinctive, knee-jerk reaction was to nearly say, 'but Athos has it worse.'

"Yes ma'am," he agreed. Alice nodded to herself, leaving to check in with the rest of her staff. In the quiet hum of ovens, the fryer, and the whirring of a stand mixer in the early morning hours, Porthos stood alone but for thoughts and his pastry tray. He picked up another strip of dough, carefully looped it leg-over-leg and through with his brawny fingers, and placed it in line on the tray.

This was what he loved. It was just hard these days.

*

For the first time in his adult life, Aramis willingly skipped church. His only consolation to himself was that it was essentially still Saturday. As it was, he'd gotten lucky in sending Athos and Porthos home early on Friday. The whole week had been a rollercoaster, and Saturday had been the final grind before the crash, which was why Aramis was sequestered in a kitschy little cafe that definitely wasn't Alice's, drinking burnt coffee that obviously hadn't been changed out since they opened that morning.

People at tables that weren't Aramis' happily chattered and drank their horrible coffee. Was this what it felt like to be d'Artagnan, noticing other chef's—or in this case, barristas—mistakes when you weren't supposed to? How irritating. Aramis could remember buying coffee from bodegas in New York that hadn't known what a filter was, let alone how to change one.

Life was different now. He tried to sip at his bad coffee.

His phone buzzed loudly on the table, and he was surprised to see the text was from Athos:

_Found a catfish at the market, made me think of you_

Below was a photo of a catfish lying playfully upon the ice. It's whiskers curled together and up in a very distinctive way that had Aramis twirling the corners of his mustache as he smiled at his phone.

_It's a very handsome fish! Tell Mr Wu i said hi._

He sipped reflexively at his coffee and grimaced. A few moments later another photo came in--Mr. Wu, holding the catfish near his face with gloved hands as he mimicked it's pouty gaping fish mouth.

A laugh broke out of Aramis before he could stop it. He didn't realize Porthos had been sent the same text until a third photo popped up, a sleepy selfie of Porthos's disgruntled face squinting at the camera, followed by, _pls guys_

_Shit, sorry_ came Athos' immediate response _I didn't know if you were home yet_

Aramis' tongue peaked out of his mouth as he tried to use one hand to hit the right combination of buttons to save the picture, stubbornly hanging on to his bad-but-warm coffee with his other. He'd lived in Canada, but his fingers had never gotten the memo. Living around the country had not acclimated him to rough weather. He was just glad there wasn't snow.

He browsed through his phone's emojis until he found a suitable one--a winking happy face blowing a kiss.

_Go back to sleep, love. I'll be there soon to warm you up_

"Aramis!" 

For a split second, Aramis had an out of body experience, looking up at his name for Porthos or Athos, only to remember where he was and guiltily cover his phone. It buzzed twice, too late, a simple text from a number he hadn't memorized yet, except for the New York area code.

_Where r you,_ and, _I'm here_

Aramis flicked his phone off, pocketing it as he looked up to find the source of the no-longer-familiar voice. He waved, and smiled.

"Marsac!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things that stalled this chapter (in order)  
> Parents  
> Pokemon Go  
> Year long man from uncle fic finally reaching its conclusion  
> Friends moving  
> Pokémon Go part 2  
> Beer brewing festival  
> Arrested Development  
> Grad school  
> Work  
> More grad school  
> Justified  
> Pokémon Go part 3 (but I finally got that damn Gangar)  
> Grad School Retreat  
> The Evil Day of Which We Shall Not Speak
> 
> And thru all that here we are!
> 
> readwing is rounding up all the recipes of this chapter. We'll post them once we get them wrangled up.

**Author's Note:**

> I have so many food tabs open for this fic right now. And readwing has cooked most of them.
> 
> Hope you're having reading as much fun as we are writing! If so, please drop a comment or kudos to let us know :)


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